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ABOUT OLD STORY-TELLERS. 


i 



ABOUT 


OLD STORY-TELLERS 


"OF" HOW 

AND WHEN 'THEY LIVED 

AND 


WHAT STORIES THEY TOLD 


BY 

DONALD G. MITCHELL 

AUTHOR OF “rBVKRIBS OF A BACHELOR,” ‘‘ MY FARM 
OP KDGKWOOD,” BTC, ETC 



NEW YORK 

CHARLES SCRIBNER’S SONS 

1905 



LIBRARY of 30NQRESS 
Two Copitu (tecMveu 


JUL 29 1905 


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Copyright by 

SCRIBNER, ARMSTRONG & CO. 
1877 - 

Copyright BY 
DONALD G. MITCHELL, 
1905. 





TO THE SMALL COMPANY 


AT EDGEWOOD, 

AND TO THE LARGER COMPANY 
WHOM THEY MEET 
ONCE A MONTH 

OVER THE PLEASANT PAGES OF ^‘ST. NICHOLAS^ 

THIS LITTLE BOOK 

IS AFFECTIONATELY DEDICATED 
BY THEIR EARNEST WELL-WISHER, 

D. G. M, 


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PREFACE. 

For the Grown-up People. 

J MAKE no doubt that elderly people will 
browse at this booklet, in the shops, if no- 
where else ; testing what flavor it may have, and 
if it will be safe reading for Ned, or Tom, or Bell, 
or such other son or grandchild as may be pull- 
ing at old heart-strings for some token of kindly 
feeling, to mark the holidays. 

For all such gracious elderly ones, I shall say a 
frank word here at the beginning about the pur- 
port of the book, and of the reasons why it has 
taken the shape it has, and of what good I hope 
it may do to the youngsters who thumb its pages 
and study its pictures. 

In the matter of books, as in the world, I 
believe in old friends, and don*t think they should 

vU 




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PREFACE. 


be laid away upon the shelf without good cause ; 
and age is hardly cause enough. 

In short, I must confess a lurking fondness for 
those good old-fashioned stories which were cur- 
rent forty years ago, — and some of them maybe 
a hundred years ago, — written in good straight- 
forward English, with good straightforward in- 
tent. I cannot get over or outlive the zest with 
which I first pored over the story of “ Lazy Law- 
rence,” or listened to it, or to that other of “ Bar- 
ring Out,” intoned by lips on whose utterance I 
hung entranced. And if Miss Edgeworth won 
such yearning, what is to be said of “ Robinson 
Crusoe,” — of “ Gulliver,” — of “ The Vicar of 
Wakefield?” Are these outlived? — or “The 
Arabian Nights,” or Grimm’s Stories, or John 
Bunyan’s “ Pilgrim ” ? 

In my own household at least, as the evenings 
have grown long in winter, and the fire-play has 
thrown its gleams over wall and floor, I have 
sought to keep alive a regard for those old-new 
books ; and have endeavored to kindle and fasten 
interest in them, by talk of their authors, and of 
the times in which they lived, and of the circum- 
stances under which they wrote, — so that the 


PREFACE. 


IX 


stories should be planted in the minds of the 
young people — not as isolated bits of fancy hav- 
ing no historic surroundings, but as growing out 
of definite epochs, and taking color from them, 
and in their way illustrating them. And I have 
sought by such a mingling of historic and bio- 
graphic tints with the thread of the stories, to 
connect them ineffaceably with the times and 
places of their production, and with the person- 
ality bf the authors, so as to make them way- 
marks, as it were, in any future and further study 
of history or of geography. 

Out of this effort and intention, has grown the 
subject matter of this little book, which is planned 
not alone for a pleasurable beguilement of time 
in reviving memories of old stories, but for carry- 
ing effective knowledge of dates and places and 
conditions which young people are blamable for 
not knowing, and which if they come to know by 
agreeable coupling of them with happy memories 
of stories told at night, will stick all the faster and 
firmer in memory. 

I have not filled out my intention so well or so 
richly as I could have hoped to do on begin- 
ning; but, such as it is, I hope the little book will 


PREFACE. 


meet kindly greeting from many — scattered up 
and down the country — who have kindred loves 
for the work and the memory of the old story- 
tellers. 



CONTENTS. 


PAGE 

PREFACE. 

For the Grown-up People vii 

I. — INTRODUCTION. 

Words to start with for Yotmg- Folks . . . . 17 

IL — FIRST PRINTERS AND THEIR HOMES. 

The Dutchmen ......... 27 

fohn Gutenberg ......... 29 

The City of Strasburg *32 

Old English Printers . 39 

III. — THE ARABIAN NIGHTS. 

Who wrote the Stories ? 42 

The Vizier's Daughter 45 

Aladdin and his Lamp ....... 50 

A Great Traveller ...... o . 58 

IV. — GOLDSMITH’S WORK. 

A Vicar and his Fa?nuy 73 

Mr. Bure hell and the Squire 76 

What happened in Prison . . . . . . .82 

Poor Goldy 85 

His Family and Death 91 

V.— GULLIVER SWIFT. 

Some Queer Little People. 96 

Some Monstrous People . . • • • . *103 

Who was Gulliver ? . 108 

Dean Swift's Love 


Ill 


Xll 


CONTENTS. 


PAGE 

VI. — AN IRISH STORY-TELLER. 

Who was She ? 115 

Her Stories 117 

Forester ..... o ... . 124 

VIL — TWO FRENCH FRIENDS. 

Burst of Revolution 129 

Days of Terror . 134 

The Guillotine 137 

Paul and Virginia 139 

The Siberian Wanderer 143 

VIIL — FAIRY REALM. 

The Grimm Brothers 149 

The Gold Bird 154 

More Queer Beasts and People . . . . . 158 

The Flower with a Pearl . . . . . .162 

IX. — A SCOTCH MAGICIAN. 

Ivanhoe 166 

The Tournament 169 

A Castle 172 

Rebecca 177 

Walter Scott's Home 182 

How and When He wrote 189 

His Life and Ways ....... 192 

X. — ROBINSON CRUSOE. 

Fifty Pounds Reward 198 

The Culprit's Work 201 

His Family ......... 204 

The Book 208 

Good-by^ Robinson! 215 

XL — HOW A TINKER WROTE A NOVEL. 

Travels of Christian . . . . . , . 219 

Great-Heart 227 

John Bunyan 232 


ILLUSTRATIONS 


PAGE 

“ Now^ tell us all about them Frontispiece. 

Vignette * 17 

Uncle Ned 19 

Once upon a Time .' 22 

Hark ! 24 

One 26 

Trying the Type 30 

The Gutenberg Monument at Strasburg 33 

Strasburg Cathedral 36 

Vignette 38 

Vignette 41 

Vizier and Daughter 46 

Rods Egg 57 

Street of Bagdad ..60 

Roc 62 

The Old Man of the Sea 67 

Ruined Temple at Bagdad 71 

Vignette 72 

Mrs. Primrose's Fine Girls 74 

Mrs. Primrose's '■'•Style" 77 

Going to Prison 8i 

Portraits of Oliver Goldsmith ...••••• 86 

Goldsmith's Lodgings 88 


XIV 


ILLUSTRA TIONS. 


PAGk 

Goldyy Johnson, and Boswell 93 

Six Inches High 98 

Gulliver on Exhibition * , 99 

Gulliver kills a Rat 107 

Dean Swift iii 

A Brobdingnag Book 114 

Basket -Woman . , , , , . • o • o ,118 

Limerick Gloves 122 

Edgeworth House 123 

Forester’* ..«•••••••. 126 

The Bastille 133 

Charlotte Cor day 136 

Bernardin de St. Pierre • • .140 

Paul and Virginia 142 

The Wanderer 

A Trio 153 

The Three Musicians . . .159 

Little Red-Cap 160 

The Elves 161 

yorindel touches the Cage 164 

Sivineherd and Wamba . 168 

A Strange Knight 1 70 

Rebecca and the Messenger 17 1 

Front de Boeuf and the Jew 173 

Cedric disguised as Priest 175 

Rebecca's Trial 179 

The Champion i8i 

The Chair, Coat, and Cane .187 

The Boy Walter Scott 192 

Daniel Defoe 199 

House where Robinson Crusoe*’ was written . • • • 207 

Robinson Crusoe 209 

Saving Traps from the Wreck . . , . . • , 216 


ILLUSTRA TIONS. 


XV 


Robinson at Home 218 

Passion and Patience . 223 

Escape from Doubting Castle 226 

yohn Bunyan 233 

Bedford Jail 235 

Bunyan's Tomb 236 


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I. 


INTRODUCTION, 


Words to start with for Young Folks. 


T he coach had 
come in at half- 
past four by the old 
clock that stood in 
the corner of the 
hall, and which had 
a dumpling-like face 
of a moon that slid 
itself into sight, by 
halves and quarters, in a most won- 
derful way. Half-past four of the 
afternoon it was, else we should 
not have been there to see, — nor 
to see the coach, which was another 
wonderful thing to behold ; a round-bodied coach, hung 
upon enormous leathern thorough-braces, on which it 
went see-sawing over the bars upon the hill-sides of 
country roads. There was a door in the middle, with a 
miniature coach painted upon its panel, with horses in 

17 



ABOUT OLD STORY-TELLERS. 


I8 

full trot (making faster time than the coach ever did in 
earnest), and over the painting was the legend, “ Eclipse 
Line.” There was a rival “ Express Line ; ” but the 
“Eclipse” was our favorite. It had the best horses, 
Harry said (he knew, Harry did) ; and the driver always 
saved a place upon the coach-roof, back of his seat, and 
this was what the “ Express ” driver never did, but 
bundled us inside, with the women. Therefore we pat- 
ronized the “ Eclipse ” line. 

A great gulf of leather, behind the coach, received 
the trunks, which were finished in that day with hairy 
skins. Will Warner (of our school) had one which he 
vowed was covered with a leopard-skin : it was certainly 
spotted. Then, under the driver’s seat of the “ Eclipse ” 
was another cavernous recess for the carpet-bags and 
small parcels ; and again, upon the coach-roof, were hat- 
boxes and band-boxes, kept from sliding off the fearful 
height by a little iron railing of two bars, against which, 
when the coach-top was free, — in vacation time, — we 
planted our feet, and, with back to back, went swaying 
and rollicking over the turnpike roads. There are no 
such coach-loads now. I think there are no such 
coaches. The Troy coach, known of hotel people and 
of overland passengers, approaches it ; but I am strongly 
of opinion that the old New-England stage-coach had a 
dignity and a character of its own, quite unapproachable 
by any vehicle of these times. What ponderous cur- 
tains, with their odor of varnish and paint ! These all 
were buttoned close upon that December afternoon ; 
and the sturdy wheels had such accumulation of half- 
frozen mud over them, and around them, as to make 
them strongly resemble the richly embossed chariot- 


INTRO D UCTION. 



wheels that were figured in our book of Roman Anti- 
quities. 

And it is for us, on that day, a triumphal chariot. 
We know what that queer-shaped box means upon the 
coach-top, — not long enough, Harry hints, for bow and 
arrows, which he had set his heart upon ; but there is 
room in it for a Noah’s ark, and balls, and battledoor, 
and a “ Boys’ Own Book,” and lots beside. For uncle 
Ned never makes 
his Christmas visit 
without a good stock 
of such things. 

And" uncle Ned 
is in the coach. 

We see his earnest, 
kindly face, and his 
white locks floating 
round it like a glory, 
before we have 
guessed at all the 
riches that must 
lie packed away in 
the Christmas-box 
on the roof. He 
had a way of cud- 

Uncle Ned. 

dling US youngsters 

in his lap we never forgot. There was aunt Effle too, 
with her queer old frontlet of curls, which she would 
persist in wearing — though it would never compare 
with her own sheen of silvery hair (we caught sight of 
her sometimes in her chamber — so we knew about 
that). She was a goodly, fat woman, — was aunt Effle, 


20 


ABOUT OLD STORY-TELLERS, 


Harry said he loved fat women. Yet he has married 
since a woman as thin as a ghost : this is the way boyish 
opinions get overset in the hurly-burly of life. 

But aunt Effie was as good as she was large. Every 
pat of her hand on our heads had the tender weight of 
all her heart in it. Not given to many words : perhaps 
because uncle Ned took all the talking to himself, for he 
fairly bubbled over with it. 

We wondered if it was aunt Efhe’s way at home, by 
the privacy of her own fireside, to interject, as she did, 
into the swift current of uncle Ned’s talk her approving 
or questioning ''.£'/^waRDE ! ” I have tried to make 
the types show, with their capitals, how she uttered it ; 
but even the capitals, rising in crescendo (you must look 
for that word in your Latin Dictionary), don’t begin to 
figure the droll effect of her “£'^waRDE ! ” 

Did these two dear old people ever love, — in the way 
of the story-books, — we wondered } Was there any 
billing and cooing I Had she ever a delicate little waist 
and golden ringlets, that “ enraptured his regard ” ? At 
this date, I don’t doubt it, — however much we all doubted 
it then. 

They were childless people ; perhaps that was the 
reason the big Christmas-box always came on time, and 
they with it. Aunt Effie, with all her love-pattings 
bestowed here and there, never failed to follow up the 
motions of uncle Ned, with a beaming eye ; and he, 
good soul, never failed to look sharply after aunt 
Effie’s comfort, or to take grace or caution from her 

A.:/waRDE ! ” as she happened to pronounce it. 

Well — these good old childless souls had come to us, 
as I said, on this December day (the one before Christ- 


INTRODUCTION, 


21 


mas), in the coach, which, with its rime of mud upon the 
wheels, was so like a Roman triumphal chariot ; and 
the Christmas-box (big enough for any thing, except the 
coveted bow and arrows) had been bestowed away for 
the morrow’s opening, and a royal supper had been 
served, with a steaming dish of oysters from the creek 
near by, and a fire had been kindled as early as three in 
the afternoon in the great south sitting-room (Frank 
and I bringing in the back-logs) ; and by seven or eight 
o’clock we were all seated around it, waiting for uncle 
Ned to begin. 

He,always told us a story on these visits. He always 
had the same chair in the corner ; and when he demurred 
or halted at the start, or said he was old and rusty, 
aunt Effie, from her corner, broke out upon him with 
‘*^^waRDE!” 

With that, he began ; since the first story-telling of his 
I could remember — always with Once upon a time.” 
I told Kitty, — who was a roly-poly dumpling of a cousin, 
but very nice, — that it would be so now ; and so it 
was. 

There is a delicious vagueness about “ once upon a 
time,” that I think takes hold upon young listeners, — 
if it does not upon the elderly ones. If we have an old 
date in full, straightway the thing becomes historic, and 
is brought to fast anchorage outside of the shadowy 
realm into which it is so delightful — on Christmas Eve 
— to wander. Again, if the story have its start-point 
a few years ago, or a few months ago, it brings up the 
thought of newspapers and news-mongers, from all 
whose note-takings we cast loose delightsomely as we 
drift out over that misty and indeterminate current of 


22 


ABOUT OLD STORY-TELLERS. 


gone-by years, which is shadowed forth darkly in — ■ 
“once upon a time.” 

Once upon a time, then 


But, bless you, I am 
not going to tell Uncle 
Ned’s story here and 
now. I didn’t prom- 
ise it ; and I have only 
led you along towards 
this pitch of expecta- 
tion to show how much 
the conditions under 
which a story is told 
serve to fix it in mind. 



We always thought 
of Christmas and big 


Once upon a Time. 


fires, and the coach coming up, — sometimes it was a 
sleigh, to be sure, — and the gifts and the little listeners, 
when we thought of Uncle Ned’s stories. And I think 
his stories — however humdrum they were (and I must 
confess, looking back upon them now, that some of them 
were terribly humdrum), were always the sweeter and 
the better for the surroundings under which they were 
told ; and that we relish the memory of them now far 
more, because we knew the surroundings, and knew 
him, and all about him, and how kindly his meaning 
was, and how aunt Effie pushed him up to the work 
of it. 

Well, I am to tell you now about other story-tellers 
not known in our family only, but known all over the 
world, far as English books ever go ; and I want you to 
understand and remember some of the circumstances 


INTRO D UCTION 


23 


under which they told their stories ; and who helped 
them on by calling out to them, and how they looked, 
and in what times they lived, and why they told such 
stories as they did. 

And I want to tell you this not only because a knowl- 
edge of it will interest you more in the work of the old 
story-tellers, but because they were famous men and 
women, about whom you ought to know. 

It is not much matter to learn if our uncle Ned came 
up on a coach, because his stories never reached very 
far, and he was not a man about whom the great world 
cares to know very much, — though they puzzle them- 
selves to learn trifling things about men not half so hon- 
est, and true, and kind as he. But when it comes to 
Oliver Goldsmith, who told a story in such a way that 
all the world read it, and French and German and Ital- 
ian people turned it into their own language, — why, it is 
well for you to know if there was an aunt Effie in his 
case, and stage-coaches ; and if he lived in New Eng- 
land, or in Ireland ; and what children he had, if any ; 
and what became of him ; and where he lies buried. 

So of Jonathan Swift, another man I shall have to 
tell you about, who was a stronger man, but not half so 
kind-hearted ; and was remembered by a great many 
people with a shudder ; and yet who told a story so witty 
and so winning, about certain queer little folks, — not 
much larger than your thumb, — that you ought to know 
about him, and remember what his life was, when you 
read what he wrote. 

Then, there are certain stories which in their way 
are very charming, about which we can’t say positively 
just when they were written. But we can learn when 


24 


ABOUT OLD STORY-TELLERS. 


they were first made generally known, and how they 
were handed down from year to year, and from genera- 
tion to generation. 

Of such are the fairy-stories belonging to all coun- 
tries, and to the books of all nations, — stories to which 
children listen always with such open-eyed wonder. 



Do the old people tell you there is harm in them } 
Well, it is a harm that must be met and conquered. 
We cannot root them out. The House that Jack built, 
it is hard to pull down. The gossips will be gossips. 
The evening shadows will throw grotesque lines on the 
greensward, that children will change into queer shapes. 


INTRODUCTION. 


25 


And while we tell of them, and of the colors which 
story-tellers have put upon these strange shapes of 
unreal things, we will try and pluck all the harm out 
of them, by treating them as we would treat any other 
unreal shadows of things which are actual. 

Those fairy-stories which have held their ground 
longest and best have almost always some good com- 
mon-sense point in them ; and in no one that I can call 
to mind, do indolence and conceit win greater rewards 
than industry ; or cunning and folly gain the battle over 
straightforward honesty. 

Apollyon is a great, shining fellow in Bunyan’s “ Pil- 
grim’s Progress;” but the point of Christian’s sword 
finds out the weak places in his harness of iron ; and 
under Great-Heart (which is a capital name for a hero), 
he goes down altogether, and is heard of no more. 

Little Red Riding Hood may be eaten up by the 
wolf who has put on her grandmother’s cap; but the 
little Red Riding Hoods who are left will look all 
the sharper on those who are full of professions, and 
not judge people by their caps, and not believe the lying 
words of the strangers they meet upon the high-roads. • 

Such patient, quiet, steadfast toil as that of Cinder- 
ella, is apt to bring to those who are not fagged by it, 
and do not give it up, the most splendid of luck — 
slipper or no slipper. There may indeed be no mar- 
riage to a prince ; but there will be a marriage to Duty, 
which will be even grander and happier ; for Duty is 
always young, and never gets slip-shod, and never has 
bad humors. 

Now, all these stories about which I have undertaken 
to tell you are printed stories ; and if there had been 


26 


ABOUT OLD STORY-TELLERS. 


no way of printing them, you would never have heard 
of them or of the lesson of them ; and it is for this 
reason that I open my budget about the story-tellers, 
by saying something concerning the man who invented 
printing, and who, if he did not print the first book, cer- 
tainly printed the first Bible. 

You must not count upon great adventures and very 
extraordinary things as happening in all the chapters 
of this book : I dare say you will think some matters 
I have to talk about, very dull matters ; but I believe 
all the things I shall tell you will be worth your knowing, 
and will help your relish for the reading of the larger 
books which I shall speak of. You know we can’t count 
upon a sunny day for every one of our summer picnics, 
nor always reckon upon a company of eager listeners 
for the stories we have to tell : it is very much to count 
on 07te. 



One. 



II. 

FIRST PRINTERS AND THEIR HOMES. 
"Ihe Dutchmen. 

I N the year 1420 there was living in the city of 
Haarlem an old gentleman, who kept the keys of 
the cathedral, and who used, after dinner, to walk in the 
famous wood, that up to this time is growing just with- 
out the city walls. One day, while walking there, he 
found a very smooth bit of beech-bark, on which — as 
he was a handy man with his Knife — he cut several let- 
ters so plainly and neatly, that after his return home he 
stamped them upon paper, and gave the paper to his 
boy as a “copy.” After this, seeing that the thing had 
been neatly done, the old gentleman, whose name was 
Lawrence Coster, fell to thinking of what might be 
done with such letters cut in wood. By blackening 
them with ink, he made black stamps upon paper ; and 
by dint of much thinking and much working, he came, 
in time, to the stamping of whole broadsides of letters, 
— which was really printing. 

But before he succeeded in doing this well, he had 
found it necessary to try many experiments, and to take 

27 



28 


ABOUT OLD STORY-TELLERS. 


into his employ several apprentices. He did his work 
very secretly, and told all of his apprentices to say noth- 
ing of the trials he was making. But a dishonest one 
among them, after a time, ran off from Holland into 
Germany, carrying with him a great many of the old 
gentleman’s wooden blocks, and entire pages of a book 
which he was about to print. 

This is the story that is told by an old Dutch writer, 
who was president of Haarlem College, and who printed 
his account a hundred and fifty years after Lawrence 
was robbed. He says he had the story from the lips 
of most respectable old citizens, who had heard it from 
their fathers ; and, furthermore, he says that he had a 
teacher in his young days, who had known, long before, 
an old servant of Lawrence Coster’s ; and this servant 
would burst into tears whenever he spoke of the way 
in which his poor master was robbed, and so lost the 
credit of his discovery. 

The Dutch writers believe this story, and hint that 
the runaway apprentice was John Faust, or John Guten- 
berg; but the Germans justly say there is no proof of 
this. It is certain, however, that there was a Lawrence 
{Gustos, or Keeper, of the cathedral), who busied himself 
with stamping letters, and with engraving. His statue is 
on the market-place in Haarlem, and his rough-looking 
books are, — some of them, — now in the “State House” 
of Haarlem. They are dingy, and printed with bad ink, 
and seem to have been struck from large engraved 
blocks, and not from movable types. They are without 
any date ; but people learned in such matters think they 
belong to a period somewhat earlier than any book of 
Faust, or of Gutenberg, who are commonly called the 
discoverers of printing. 


J-'IRST PRINTERS AND THEIR HOMES. 29 


John Gutenberg. 

John Gutenberg, at the , very time when this old 
Dutchman was experimenting with his blocks in Hol- 
land, was also working in his way, very secretly, in a 
house that was standing not many years ago in the 
ancient city of Strasburg. He had two working part- 
ners, who were bound by oath not to reveal the secret 
of the arts he was engaged upon. But one of these 
partners died ; and upon this, his heirs claimed a right 
to know the secrets of Gutenberg. Gutenberg refused ; 
and there was a trial of the case, some account of which 
was discovered more than three hundred years after- 
ward in an old tower of Strasburg. 

This trial took place in the year 1439. Gutenburg 
was not forced to betray his secret ; but it did appear, 
from the testimony of the witnesses, that he was occu- 
pied with some way of making books (or manuscripts) 
cheaper than they had ever been made before. 

But Gutenberg was getting on so poorly at Strasburg, 
and lost so much money in his experiments, that he 
went away to Mayence, which is a German city farther 
down the Rhine. He there formed a partnership with 
a rich silversmith named John Faust, who took an oath 
of secrecy, and supplied him with money, on condition 
that after a certain time it should be repaid to him. 

Then Gutenberg set to work in earnest. Some ac- 
counts say he had a brother who assisted him ; and the 
Dutch writers think this brother may have been the 
robber of poor Lawrence Coster. But there is no proof 
of it ; and it is too late to find any proof now. There 


30 


ABOUT OLD STORY-TELLERS. 


was certainly a Peter Schoffer, a scribe, or designer, who 
worked for Gutenberg, and who finished up his first 
books by drawing lines around the pages, and making 
ornamental initial letters, and filling up gaps in the 



Trying the Type. 


printing. This Schoffer was a shrewd fellow, and 
watched Gutenberg very closely. He used to talk over 
what he saw, and what he thought, with Faust. He 
told Faust he could contrive better types than Guten- 
berg was using; and, acting on his hints, Faust, who 


FlkST P JOINTERS AND THEIR HOMES, 31 

was a skilful worker in metals, run types in a mould ; 
and these were probably the first cast types ever made. 
These promised so well that Faust determined to get 
rid of Gutenberg, and to carry on the business with 
Schoffer — to whom he gave his only daughter Chris- 
tine for a wife. 

P'aust called on Gutenberg for his loan shortly after, 
which Gutenberg couldn’t pay ; and in consequence he 
had to give up to Faust all his tools, his presses, and 
his unfinished work, among which was a Bible nearly 
two-thirds completed. This, Faust and Schoffer hurried 
through, and sold as a manuscript. They sold it as a 
manuscript, because manuscripts brought high prices, 
and because if it were known that this Bible was made 
in some easier and cheaper way, they could not be sure 
of so good a price ; and besides, this would make people 
curious to find out about this easier way of making 
books, which Faust and Schoffer wished to keep secret. 

There are two copies in the National Library at Paris ; 
one copy at the Royal Library at Munich ; and one at 
Vienna. It is not what is commonly known as the May- 
ence Bible, but is of earlier date than that. 

It is without name of printer or publisher, and with- 
out date. It is in two great volumes folio, of about six 
hundred pages a volume. You very likely could not 
read a word of it if you were to see it ; for it is in Latin, 
and in black Gothic type, with many of the words 
abbreviated, and packed so closely together as to puzzle 
the eye. I give a line of this printing to show you that 
it would not make easy reading. Should you chance to 
own a copy (and you probably never will), you could sell 
it for enough money to buy yourself a little library of 
about two thousand volumes. 


32 


ABOUT OLD STORY-TELLERS. 


Q(wiit(2eil|iam:f4(ttria0 autgomit 

It was certainly the first Bible printed from movable 
types ; but poor Gutenberg got no money from it, 
though he had done most of the work upon it. But he 
did not grow disheartened. He toiled on, though he 
was without the help of Schoffer and of Faust, and in a 
few years afterward succeeded in making books which 
were as good as those of his rivals. Before he died his 
name was attached to books printed as clearly and 
sharply as books are printed to-day. 

Of course they are very proud of his memory in the 
old Rhine town of Mayence, where he labored ; and 
they have erected a statue there to his memory, — from 
a design by the great Danish sculptor, Thorwaldsen, 
This statue was erected in August, 1837; and there 
was a great festival on the occasion — fifteen thousand 
people crowding into the town to assist in doing honor 
to the memory of the first printer. The old cathedral 
was thronged ; the Bishop of Mayence said high mass ; 
and the first Bible printed by Gutenberg was displayed. 
On the site where he worked there is now a club-house ; 
and the gentlemen of the club-house have erected 
another little statue to Gutenberg in the inner court 
of their building. 

7he City of Sirasburg. 

But Strasburg is as proud of him as Mayence ; for in 
Strasburg the burghers of that city say he studied out 
the plans which he afterward carried into execution 



The Guttenberg Monument at Strasburg 





FIRST PRINTERS AND THEIR HOMES. 35 


at Mayence. So in Strasburg, in 1840, they erected 
another statue to his memory, by David, a French 
sculptor. It is of bronze, and is one of the imposing 
sights of the city — as you may see from the picture I 
have given of it. 

I have a little copy of the head of Gutenberg as he 
is represented in this statue, in plaster and wax, which 
I brought away from Strasburg a great many years 
ago. It is before me as I write, — a cap trimmed with 
fur upon the head, a sober and most comely face, a long 
beard which would have become a Hebrew patriarch. 
He must have been a man of noble presence ; and, 
though we know but very little of his personal history, it 
is certain that his name and his fame will live among 
those of the greatest inventors. Every book you read is 
a monument to his memory ; and he is deserving of 
most kindly remembrance, because he busied himself 
throughout a long life, in making serviceable an art 
which is of the greatest benefit to everybody. Those 
who made dictionaries of biography in the centuries 
which followed closely after him didn’t think it worth 
their while to gather up any facts about his life, or even 
to mention him ; but they spent a great deal of useless 
labor in inquiries about the lives of petty princes who 
made wars for conquest, and of students who made wars 
with words, for conquest in some petty points of theol- 
ogy ; but these princes and bookworms are forgotten 
now, while John Gutenberg in that noble statue of the 
old city of Strasburg is looked upon, and thought of, 
and honored, more than if Dr. Bayle had written one 
of his longest and fullest folio pages about him. 

You will see the statue if you ever go to Strasburg; 


36 


ABOUT OLD STORY-TELLERS. 


and you will see the cathedral too, which is one of the 
grandest and most beautiful of Europe. The tallest 
spire in New York would hardly reach half way to its 

top ; and four or five coun- 
try church towers, if piled 
one upon the other, would 
not make a scaffolding high 
enough to reach the middle 
of its spire. I give a 
glimpse of it, as you see it 
over the quaint roofs of the 
city, in order that you may 
associate it with the story 
of the first printer. 

You will see that only one 
of its towers bears a spire : 
upon the top of the shorter 
tower there is a little cot- 
tage of entertainment, more 
than two hundred feet above 
the level of the pavement. 
Here, those who venture on 
a climb to this lofty plateau 
may rest, and consider — if 
they will mount still higher 
into the regions of air, where 
the great spire will carry 
them if they choose to go. 
tried this second climbing ; 
open as a lattice, and the 



Strasburg Cathedral. 


Some thirty years ago I 
but the stone-work is as 
people on the street far below looked like pygmies, and 
the whole city and spire seemed to reel with me ; and 


FIRST PRINTERS AND THEIR HOMES. 37 


such a degree of dizziness crept over me, that I was 
glad to get down again to what seemed the solid footing 
of the deck of the tower. 

And was the great cathedral there when Gutenberg 
was worrying over his types in that ancient city > Yes : 
Gutenberg saw it ; very likely he saw some of the 
last stones placed upon the tower ; for though it was 
commenced three or four centuries before, and was in 
course of building when Wallace was fighting so bravely 
in the glens of Scotland (about which you will remem- 
ber, if you have read “ The Scottish Chiefs ”), the tower 
was only completed in 1365. 

Another thing to remember about this great cathe- 
dral, which throws its shadow upon Gutenberg’s statue, 
is, — Sabina Erwin of Steinbach, a daughter of the great 
architect, conducted and directed the building of much 
of it in the years when it was being finished. Think of 
that when you hear that women can do no grand things ! 
Think, too, that in those very years, when Gutenberg 
was printing his first book, that other wonderful woman 
Joan of Arc, was putting courage into French armies 
by leading them herself, — and the first printer was 
very likely one of those who grieved greatly when they 
learned that the poor, brave Joan had been burned in 
the city of Rouen, by order of the cruel English com- 
mander. • 

I don’t think that Gutenberg ever saw the clock that 
you may now see in the Cathedral of Strasburg, for it 
has only been there a little over three hundred years. 
But it is a famous clock : I would not dare to tell you of 
all the amazing things its hidden machinery can do. 
The figures of the apostles march ; a cock claps his 


38 


ABOUT OLD STORY-TELLERS. 


wings, and crows ; death (in the shape of a skeleton) 
appears ; and there are chimes, and sweet jangling 
sounds ; and the moon shows its changes, and the plan- 
ets too. 

But, most of all, think, — in connection with this 
great church building and the clock and the spire, and 
the rich pates de foie gras which they give you for dinner 
in Strasburg, — think of the old long-bearded prince of 
printers, who by his art and toil and genius contrived 
movable types, and first made it possible for all the men 
who can tell stories worth a long life, to repeat them in 
print, so that you may take them in your hand to study, 
and dream over, and enjoy. 



FIRST PRINTERS AND THEIR HOMES. 


39 


Old English Printers. 

But who printed the first English book? And did 
that follow quickly afterward ? Not many years — per- 
haps twenty. And the man who did this was named 
William Caxton — a name which has been held in very 
great honor ever since. 

He was in early life apprentice to a seller of dry-goods 
in London ; but he was an excellent apprentice ; and his 
master came to be Mayor of London, and left him a fair 
fortune. His zeal and industry made him a marked 
man, — so that he was sent by the Government over to 
Flanders, to the city of Bruges, where Philip the Good of 
Burgundy was ruling. And there he studied, and there 
he came to a knowledge of what Gutenberg had been 
doing, and of what Faust had been doing, in Mayence. 
And he translated the “Histories of Troye” — for he 
had made himself a good scholar ; and he secured some 
of the workmen who had been with Faust and Schoffer, 
after their printing-office was broken up by a war that 
raged in that day along the Rhine ; and, taking over the 
workmen into England, he set up a printing-office at 
Westminster, — in some outbuilding of the famous West- 
minster Abbey, — and there printed his Histories of 
Troye, and many another book ; among them a Life of 
Charles the Great, of which he says, “ I have specially 
reduced it (translated it) after the simple cunning that 
God hath lent to me, whereof I humbly and with all 
my heart thank Him, and also am bounden to pray for 
my fathers and mothers souls, that in my youth set me 
to school, by which, by the sufferance of God, I get my 
living I hope truly.” 


40 


ABOUT OLD STORY-TELLERS. 


And in this spirit of old-fashioned honesty and zeal, 
the good printer toiled all the days of his life. 

And after his death, the men who had worked with 
him — of whom Wynkyn de Worde was chief — car- 
ried on labor in the same spirit, and looked forward to 
“the happy day when a Bible should be chained in 
every church, for every Christian man to look upon.” 

And this was a great thing to look forward to in that 
day. Books had borne and were bearing a value which 
would astonish you now. An old Italian called Poggio 
had — in those centuries, and not long before — ex- 
changed his manuscript copy of Livy for a country villa 
near to Florence. 

In England, the cost of copying a book in writing 
was worth the price of two fat oxen. Chaining books 
to desks was not uncommon ; but it was not in every 
church they were chained. They were in great reli- 
gious houses, called monasteries and abbeys ; or they 
were carefully guarded in the cabinets of kings. 

The bindings of many of the old manuscript books, 
and of the early printed ones, were enriched with very 
rare carving in ivory or wood, or they were enamelled 
beautifully on copper and adorned with pearls and rare 
stones, and their clasps were of silver and of gold. 
Many bindings of this sort are now kept with great care 
in European museums, and are very much valued. In 
che old church of Monza, which is an Italian town very 
near to Milan, there is a very old and curious piece of 
book-binding, which, with its manuscript of the Gospels 
in Greek, was given to the church by Theodolinda, a 
good and famous queen of the Lombards, who lived 
twelve hundred years ago. It is of silver and gold, and 


FIRST PRINTERS AND THEIR HOMES. 4I 


set over with precious stones, and is, I think, the oldest 
bound book in the world. It was a very old book, and 
a prized book, when Wynkyn de Worde talked about 
chaining a Bible, some day, in every church. 

What would the good old man have thought of Bibles 
printed and sold for only a few pennies each } What 
would the first English printer have thought, if he had 
been told that within three centuries, in a country un- 
heard of by him (for Columbus sailed on his first voy- 
age the very year on which William Caxton died), and 
in a single city of that country, more type would be set 
up in one day, than was set up in all Europe during 
the space of a year, in his time ? 




III. 

THE ARABIAN NIGHTS 
Who wrote the Stories? 

W HO knows ? Not Captain Mayne Reid ; though 
had he been born a Persian, and lived long 
time enough ago, and been a Caliph with a long beard 
and a cimiter — instead of a captain in the Mexican 
war, with a Colt’s revolver and a goatee, — and had he 
seen the cloud of dust which Ali-Baba saw, I think he 
could have made out the band of forty robbers under 
it, and the cave, and all the rest. 

But Mayne Reid didn’t see the cloud of dust which 
covered those robbers (and which is very apt to cover 
all gangs of public robbers), and did not live so long 
ago, and therefore did not write “The Arabian Nights.” 
Nor did Mrs. Hannah More, for the book is not in her 
style ; nor did the author of “ Little Women.” 

You could never guess who wrote “The Arabian 
Nights,” — for nobody knows when those stories were 
first written. It seems very odd that a book should be 
made, and no one able to tell when it was made. The 

42 


THE ARABIAN NIGHTS. 


43 


publishers don’t allow such things to happen nowadays. 
Yet it is even so with the book we are talking of. Of 
course it is possible to fix the date of the many trans- 
lations of “ The Arabian Nights ” which have been made 
into the languages of Europe from the old Arabic 
manuscripts. Thus it was in the year 1704 that a cer^ 
tain Antoine Galland, a distinguished Oriental scholar 
of Paris, who had travelled in the East, and who had 
collected many curious manuscripts and medals, pub- 
lished a French translation of what was called “The 
Thousand and One Nights.” This was in the time of the 
gay court of Louis the Fourteenth ; and the fine ladies of 
the court — those of them who could read — all devoured 
the book ; and the school-boys throughout France 
(though there were not many school-boys in those days 
outside of the great cities) all came to know the won- 
derful stories of Aladdin and of Ali-Baba. Remember 
that this was about the time when the great Duke of 
Marlboro’ was winning his famous victories on the Con- 
tinent, — specially that of Blenheim ; about which an 
English poet. Dr. Southey, has written a quaint little 
poem, which you should read. It was in the lifetime, 
too, of Daniel Defoe, — who wrote that ever-charming 
story of Robinson Crusoe some twelve or fourteen years 
later ; and the first newspaper in America — called “ The 
Boston News Letter” — was printed in the same year 
in which Antoine Galland published his translation of 
“The Thousand and One Nights.” If you should go 
to Paris, and be curious to see it, you can find in the 
Imperial Library, or the National Library (or whatever 
those changeable French people may call it now), the 
very manuscript of Antoine Galland. 


44 


ABOUT OLD STORY-TELLERS. 


Some years afterward there was a new and fuller 
translation by another Oriental scholar, who had suc- 
ceeded M. Galland as professor of Arabic in the Royal 
College. Then there followed, in the early part of this 
century, translations into English ; and I suppose that 
American boys in the days of President Monroe took 
their first taste of those gorgeous Arabian tales. 

But the completest of all the collections was made 
by a German scholar, Mr. Von Hammer, in the year 
1824 — not so far back but that your fathers and moth- 
ers may remember little stray paragraphs in the papers, 
which made mention of how a German scholar had 
traced these old Arabian tales back to a very dim anti^ 
quity in India ; and how he believed they had thence 
gone into Persia, where the great men of the stories all 
became Caliphs ; and how they floated thence, by hear- 
say, into Arabia (which was a country of scribes and 
scholars in the days of Haroun al Raschid) ; and how 
they there took form in the old Arabic manuscripts 
which Antoine Galland had found and translated. But 
during the century that had passed since M. Galland’s 
death, other and fuller Arabic copies had been found, 
with new tales added, and with other versions of the 
tales first told. 

But what we call the machinery of the stories was 
always much the same ; and the same Genii flashed out 
in smoke and flame, and the same cimiters went blaz- 
ing and dealing death through all the copies of “ The 
Thousand and One Nights.” 

But why came that title of The Thousand and One 
Nights,” which belonged, and still belongs, to all the 
European collections of these old Arabian stories } I 


THE ARABIAN NIGHTS. 


45 


will tell you why ; and in telling you why, I shall give 
you the whole background on which all these various 
Arabian stories, wherever found, are arrayed. And the 
background is itself a story, and this is the way it 
runs : — 

7he Vizier’s Daughter. 

Once there lived a wicked Sultan of Persia, whose 
name was Schahriar ; and he had many wives — like 
the Persian Shah who went journeying into England a 
few summers ago ; and he thought of his wives as stock- 
owners think of their cattle — and I fear the present 
Persian Shah thinks no otherwise. 

Well, when this old Schahriar found that his wives 
were faithless and deceitful, — as all wives will be who 
are esteemed no more than cattle, — he vowed that he 
would cut off all chance of their sinning by making 
an end of them : so it happened that whatever new 
wife he espoused one day, he killed upon the next. 

You will think the brides were foolish to marry him ; 
but many women keep on making as foolish matches all 
the world over ; and she who marries a sot, or the man 
who promises to be a sot, is killed slowly, instead of 
being killed quickly with a bow-string, — as the Schah- 
riar did his work. 

Besides, all women of the East were slaves, as they 
are mostly now, and subject to whatever orders the 
Sultan might make. 

Now, it happened that this old Schahriar had a vizier, 
or chief officer under him, who executed all his mur- 
derous orders, and who was horrified by the cruelties 
he had to commit. And this same vizier had a beauti* 


46 ABOUT OLD STORY-TELLERS. 

ful and accomplished daughter, who was even more 
horrified than her father ; and she plotted how she 
might stay the bloody actions of the Schahriar. 



Vizier and Daughter. 


She could gain no access to him, and could hope to 
win no influence over him, except by becoming his 
bride ; but, if she became his bride, she would have but 
one day to live. So, at least, thought her sisters and 


THE ARABIAN NIGHTS. 


47 


her father. She, of course, found it very hard to win 
the consent of her father, the vizier, to her plan ; but at 
last she succeeded, and so arranged matters that the 
Schahriar should command her to be his bride. 

The fatal marriage-day came, and the vizier was in an 
agony of grief and alarm. The morning after the 
espousals, he waited — in an ecstasy of fear — the 
usual order for the slaughter of the innocent bride ; but 
to his amazement and present relief, the order was 
postponed to the following day. 

This bride, whose name was Scheherazade, — known 
now to school-boys and school-girls all over the world, 

— was most beguiling of speech, and a most charming 
story-teller. And on the day of her marriage she had 
commenced the narration of a most engrossing story to 
her husband the Schahriar ; and had so artfully timed it, 
and measured out its length, that, when the hour came 
for the Sultan to set about his cares of office, she should 
be at its most interesting stage. The Sultan had been 
so beguiled by the witchery of her narrative, and so 
eager to learn the issue, that he put off the execution 
of his murderous design, in order to hear the termina- 
tion of the story on the following night. 

And so rich was the narration, and so great was the 
art of the princess Scheherazade, that she kept alive 
the curiosity and wonder of her husband, the Sultan, 

— day after day, and week after week, and month after 
month, — until her fascinating stories had lasted for a 
thousand and one nights. 

If you count up these you will find they make a 
period of two years and nine months — during which 
she had beguiled the Sultan, and stayed the order for 


48 


ABOUT OLD STORY-TELLERS. 


her execution. In the interval, children had been born 
to her ; and she had so won upon her husband, that he 
abolished his cruel edict forever, — on condition that 
from time to time she should tell over again those 
enchanting stories. And the stories she told on those 
thousand and one nights, and which have been recited 
since in every language of Europe, thousands and thou- 
sands of times, are the Arabian Nights tales. 

If this account is not true in all particulars, it is at 
least as true as the stories are. 

A good woman sacrificed herself to work a deed of 
benevolence. That story, at any rate, is true, and is 
being repeated over and over in lives all around us. 

But, after all, the question is not answered as to whc 
wrote “The Arabian Nights.” I doubt if it ever will be 
answered truly. Who cares, indeed 1 I dare say that 
youngsters in these days of investigation committees 
are growing up more curious and inquiring than they 
used to be ; but I know well I cared or thought noth- 
ing about the authorship in those old school days when 
I caught my first reading of Aladdin and the Wonderful 
Lamp. 

What a night it was ! What a feast ! I think I could 
have kissed the hand that wrote it. 

A little red morocco-bound book it was, with gilt 
edges to the leaves, that I had borrowed from Tom 
Spooner; and Tom Spooner’s aunt had loaned it to him, 
and she thought all the world of it, and had covered it 
in brown paper, and I mustn’t soil it, or dog’s-ear it 
And I sat down with it — how well I remember ! — at a 
little square-legged red table in the north recitation- 
room at E school ; and there was a black hole in 


THE ARABIAN NIGHTS. 


49 


the top of the table — where Dick Linsey, who was a 
military character, and freckled, had set off a squib of 
gunpowder (and got trounced for it) ; and the smell of 
the burnt powder lingered there, and came up grateful- 
ly into my nostrils, as I read about the sulphurous 
clouds rolling up round the wonderful lamp, and the 
Genie coming forth in smoke and flames ! 

What delight ! If I could only fall in with an old 
peddler with a rusty lamp, — such as Aladdin’s, — 
wouldn’t I rub it ! 

And with my elbows fast on the little red table, and 
my knees fast against the square legs, and the smell of 
the old squib regaling me, I thought what I would 
order the Genie to do, if I ever had a chance : — A 
week’s holiday to begin with ; and the Genie should be 
requested to set the school ‘^principal” down, green 
spectacles and all, in the thickest of the woods some- 
where on the ^‘mountain.” Saturday afternoons should 
come twice a week — at the very least ; turkey, with 
stuffing, every day except oyster day. I would have a 
case of pocket-knives “ Rogers’ superfine cutlery ” — 
(though Kingsbury always insisted that Wosten- 
holm’s ” were better) brought into my closet, and would 
give them out, cautiously, to the clever boys. I would 
have a sled, brought by the Genie, that would beat 
Ben Brace’s “Reindeer,” he bragged so much about, — 
by two rods, at least. I would have a cork jacket, with 
which I could swim across Snipsic Lake, where it was 
widest, — twice over, — and think nothing of it. I 
would have a cavern, like the salt mines in Cracow, 
Poland (as pictured in Parley’s Geography) ; only, in- 
stead of salt, it should all be rock-candy ; and I would 


50 


ABOUT OLD STORY-TELLERS. 


let in clever fellows and pretty girls, and the homely 
ones, too — well, as often as every Wednesday. 

Ah, well-a-day ! we never come to the ownership of 
such caverns ! We never find a peddler with the sort 
of lamp that will bring any sort of riches — with wish- 
ing. 

But, my youngsters, there is a Genie that will come 
to any boy’s command, and will work out amazing 
things for you all through boyhood, and all through 
life ; and his name is — Industry. 

And now, if your lessons are all done, and if you 
will keep in mind what I have said about “ The Arabian 
Nights,” and their history, we will have a taste of these 
Eastern stories. 

slladdin and his Lamp. 

Aladdin was the son of a poor old woman who lived 
in a city of China. His father was dead, and he didn’t 
work as he should have done to support his old mother : 
in fact, all his early life was not the sort of one out of 
which men are apt to grow into heroes. 

He was idling in the streets one day — as idle fellows 
will — when he met a strange man with a dark face, 
who asked Aladdin his name, and told him he was a 
relative of his father’s, and would befriend him ; and 
thereupon he gave him some gold coins, with which 
Aladdin ran off home. 

After a few days this strange man (who was a magician 
— though Aladdin couldn’t know that) met the boy again, 
and gave him more monev, and paid a visit to his old 
mother, and promised to set up the boy in trade, which 


THE ARABIAN NIGHTS. 


51 


he did do — furnishing him silks to sell, or whatever 
the city people would be apt to buy. And this same 
strange dark man used to take Aladdin about the city, 
and show him all the wonderful sights ; and finally led 
him one day far beyond the city walls, to a retired place 
between two mountains. There with the help of Alad- 
din he builds a fire (a great many of the wonders of 
these tales turn upon the secret power of fire) ; then he 
utters a few magical words, and the ground opens, show- 
ing an iron plate, which Aladdin lifts, and lo ! there 
appear steps going down into a cavern in the earth. 

The magician instructs Aladdin how he is to descend, 
— tells him what halls of treasure he will pass through, 
and gardens with splendid fruit, — tells him how he 
must touch nothing till he reaches the farthest chamber, 
where he will find an iron lamp in a niche of the wall. 
This he must seize upon, and bring back : after he has 
secured this, he may pluck as much of the fruit as he 
chooses. Lastly he puts on the boy’s finger a ring, 
which will give him safety and help. 

So Aladdin enters, — marches through the great glit- 
tering corridors (which, though they were deep under 
ground, were as light as day), — passes through the gar- 
dens, and reaches and seizes the lamp. 

He picks some of the fruit in the garden ; but what 
seemed fruit are only topazes and diamonds and pearls. 
Of course he fills his purse and his pockets ; and, ar- 
rived at the steps, the magician asks him to hand up 
the lamp. 

But Aladdin is cautious : perhaps he suspects a little 
false play on the part of the magician, and he refuses 
until he shall have come fairly out. 


52 


ABOUT OLD STORY-TELLERS. 


At this the magician in a rage utters again a few 
magical words, and the ground and iron door close on 
poor Aladdin. He wanders in despair up and down. 
He calls out ; but who can hear him in those depths } 
At last he betakes himself to prayer ; and, in the act 
of clasping his hands, he rubs slightly the ring upon 
his finger. Upon this a great Genie appears in smoke 
and flame, by whose power he is placed outside once 
more, and he wanders back to his mother’s house in 
the city. 

I don’t know what became of his shop and stock of 
goods ; or what became of his pocket-full of rubies and 
diamonds. The story doesn’t say ; but it does say that 
he felt hungry on one occasion, when there was no bread 
in the house, and no money. So he determined to sell 
the old lamp : the mother thinks no one will buy it, ex- 
cept she brighten it up a little. But she has no sooner 
set to work at the scouring, than smoke and flame fill 
the place, and out of the smoke and flame comes a ter- 
rible Genie, who offers to do Aladdin’s bidding. 

Aladdin wants food ; and straightway, the Genie hav- 
ing vanished, slaves come in from some unknown quar- 
ter, and bring silver and gold dishes heaped up with 
meats and fruits such as these humble people had 
never tasted before. And when after some days the 
meats are gone, the gold dishes are sold to a Jew, and 
they have money for months longer. Two or three 
times in the course of a year this is repeated : the lamp 
is rubbed ; the Genie comes ; the food in golden dishes 
is sent up ; the dishes are sold. I don’t think Aladdin 
can have made a very good bargain with the Jew who 
bought his dishes. For my part, I think I should have 


THE ARABIAN NIGHTS. 53 

commanded the Genie to bring a good batch of “ cur 
rent funds,” and bought my own dishes. But Aladdin 
didn’t. 

He began shortly to have ambitious views about get- 
ting up in the world. He had seen the Sultan’s daugh- 
ter, and, approving of her looks, thought he would like 
to marry her. He sent his old mother to “ interview ” 
the Sultan on the subject. 

People at the court hooted her at the first ; but she 
bore great gifts of jewels and gold, — so great that at 
last the Sultan listened, and promised that at the end of 
a certain time his daughter would receive the addresses 
of this unknown lover. 

But, as the Sultan had already the rare jewels in his 
own keeping, he did not keep very fast in mind poor 
Aladdin ; and so Aladdin woke one morning to hear the 
bells ringing for the marriage of the Sultan’s daughter. 
However, by the aid of the lamp and the Genie, he put 
difficulties in the way of this new marriage ; and sent 
such splendid gifts that at last he won his purpose ; and 
his marriage day with the beautiful daughter of the 
Sultan was really appointed. He built a magnificent 
palace — all through the Genie of the lamp — in which 
he was to live ; and he purposely left one window in the 
great hall unfinished, and then he challenged the best 
work-people of the Sultan to complete it. 

The Sultan sent his cunningest workmen, and his 
whole stock of jewels, to make the window of the 
palace as perfect as the rest. But they could not do it. 
The laborers were not cunning enough, and the jewels 
were not rare enough. So Aladdin ordered them away ; 
and then (with his lamp, and a little rubbing of it) he 
called his Genie, and all was finished in an hour’s time. 


54 


ABOUT OLD STORY-TELLERS. 


The Sultan’s daughter seems to have liked Aladdin ; 
and they lived very happily together for a while in this 
palace. I dare say the old people of the court thought 
Aladdin an upstart, and perhaps they didn’t visit him 
notwithstanding his wife’s position. 

Meantime, what has become of that African magr 
cian He had gone away — across Tartary possibly, 
and by way of Bagdad very likely, to his own country, — ' 
thinking poor Aladdin was buried in the cavern. But, 
by his magic, he learned after a time how things had 
turned in China : so he travelled back to get possession 
of the wonderful lamp. The way in which he did this 
was a very shrewd way ; for he disguised himself as 
a peddler of new and flash trinkets, and offered to 
change them for old candlesticks or old lamps. 

If he had lived in our time, he would have found that 
women love old candlesticks very much more than any 
new things ; but it was not so then ; and he went to the 
gates of this splendid Aladdin palace, bawling his wares, 
and offering to change new lamps for old ones. And 
some slave — I suppose an upper chambermaid — re- 
ported what he said to the princess Buddir al Buddoor 
(which was the name of Aladdin’s bride). And she 
hinted to the princess that an old lamp stood always on 
her master’s table, which was so ugly and old, that it 
would be much better to have a new one in place of it. 

The princess Buddir thought the same ; and, Aladdin 
being away a-hunting, the bargain was made. 

What do you think came of it } Why, next morning, 
when the Sultan waked up, he looked over to admire the 
fine palace of his son-in-law, and behold ! there was no 
palace there ! The African magician (by the aid of the 
lamp) had whisked it away into his own country 


THE ARABIAN NIGHTS. 


55 


Poor Aladdin, when he came back from hunting, had 
a sorry time of it, and the Sultan threatened to take off 
his head. But he begged grace for two months or so, 
in which time he hoped to get things straight again. 

What way should he turn .? He knew it must all 
come of the lamp ; but where to find it } He thought 
if he could discover the princess, he might learn some- 
thing about the lamp ; though I am afraid he lamented 
the loss of the lamp more than he did the loss of the 
princess. He remembered the ring the magician had 
given him, and gave it a good rubbing ; sure enough, 
the old Genie that had met him in the cavern came 
back in smoke and flame. The Genie couldn’t give 
back his bride to him ; but it transported him over land 
and sea in a twinkling, and set him down under the 
walls of his lost palace, which was standing now in the 
magician’s country, just as complete and beautiful as it 
stood before in China. This was very wonderful. I 
suppose if the African newspapers of that time re- 
marked upon it, they probably said, — “ We observe that 
a fine residence has gone up on Pyramid Street, adding 
much to the value of property in that locality, and doing 
credit to the taste and enterprise of our fellow towns- 
man Mr. Magic.” 

Aladdin saw through the blinds of a window of the 
residence the beloved Buddir (I suppose he called her 
Budd, or perhaps Rosebud) ; and she saw him, and 
sent her maid to open the postern, or whatever the gate 
was called ; and he came in, and learned how it had 
all happened. And Rosebud said the magician came 
every day, and was trying to win her affections. Alad- 
din told her not to bluff him outright ; but to treat him 


56 ABOUT OLD STORY-TELLERS. 

kindly, and ask him to take supper with her. Then he 
goes to a drug-shop near by, and buys a powder, — 
sulphate of morphia, perhaps, — and, returning quietly 
and secretly, causes the powder to be put in the magi- 
cian’s cup. 

That is the end of the magician. The lamp — as you 
will have guessed — was in his bosom; and Aladdin 
takes it out — rubs it, and whisks his palace — Rose- 
bud and all — back to China once more. 

The Sultan is delighted to find things on their old 
footing. And I suppose the China newspapers said, 
“ We are gratified to see that the residence of our friend 
Col. Aladdin is again in position, and occupied by the 
esteemed family of the colonel. Its temporary dis- 
placement is said to have been due to a slight earth- 
quake, against which in future we understand that the 
colonel has abundantly provided. Mrs. Col. Aladdin, 
nie Buddir, is, we learn, in her usual health, not having 
suffered, as was at first reported, by the catastrophe.” 

Things were now going on very swimmingly with 
Aladdin ; and they would have continued thus, had not 
an old lady who boasted of being very religious (which 
is not a thing to boast of) put herself in the way of 
Princess Budd, and so won upon her, that Rosebud 
thought she would do nothing without taking the advice 
of Fatima, — which was the name of the pretended 
holy woman. 

Rosebud asked Fatima how she liked her palace, and 
her crockery, and her great Hall. Fatima liked it all 
very well, except the Hall, which she thought wanted a 
Roc’s egg hung up in the middle. 

It must have been a very great hall ; for a Roc’s egg 


THE ARABIAN NIGHTS. 


57 


was so large that when it lay upon the plain it looked 
like a round-topped temple. 

But perhaps Budd had never seen one — probably not. 
She asked Aladdin to get her a Roc’s egg. So he takes 
to his lamp, and calls up his Genie. 

For once the Great Slave was raging with anger. 
The house shook ; flames darted from the eyes of the 
Genie. Aladdin did not know that the Roc was own 
cousin to this creature of smoke and flame — and that 
they were much attached to each other. 



Roc’s Egg. 


The Genie at last cooled down, and told Aladdin how 
it was ; and told him, besides, that the holy woman was 
no woman at all — only a brother of the wicked magi- 
cian, who had murdered the true Fatima, and had made 
his way into the palace to destroy Aladdin, and get pos- 
session of the Wonderful Lamp. 

So Aladdin determined to meet the tricks of the 
magician with a trick of his own. He pretended to be 
sick, and summoned the holy woman to comfort him : 
he watched her narrowly, and saw that under the folds 


58 


ABOUT OLD STORY-TELLERS. 


of her gown she had a dagger in hand. Seizing his 
chance, he snatched it from her, and plunged it in her 
bosom ; and that was the end of the other magician. 

Rosebud was greatly shocked ; for she thought still it 
was Fatima who was murdered. She dried her tears 
when Aladdin told her the true story. And ever after 
they lived together in great comfort, and kept the 
Wonderful Lamp till they died. 

And who do you think has the Lamp now ? Nobody 
knows. 

It seems strange that such a lazy, good-for-nothing 
fellow as Aladdin is said to be in the beginning of the 
story, should have come to such great luck. Such boys 
in our day don’t come to any thing good or great. The 
only way I can account for it is — by supposing that 
there was really no lamp at all, and that the old story- 
teller intended what he calls the Lamp to mean — only 
Industry and Watchfulness — which, as long as Aladdin 
kept and used, brought him riches and honor ; and 
whenever he lost hold on them — every thing turned out 
badly. 


Great Traveller. 

In the time of the great Haroun al Raschid 

You don’t know who the great Haroun al Raschid 
was } 

He was a real Eastern monarch, surnamed The Just, 
who lived about eleven hundred years ago in Bagdad. 
He loved science, and loved letters ; he loved fair 
women, and he loved pearls and jewels. 

I don’t know if all is true that the histories tell about 


THE ARABIAN NIGHTS. 59 

him ; but he must have been a grand monarch, and lived 
in more luxury than most monarchs. 

I can’t forget the stories of him, which an old teacher 
of my boyish days put in my mind. They cling so to 
my memory, that I never hear the sweetly-flowing 
name of Haroun al Raschid, but I seem to see great 
gardens full of bloom, and thrones with jewels crusted 
on them, and sparkling fountains, and flashing swords, 
and silken turbans, and troops of camels, and palm- 
trees lifting their tops into the dreamy haze of East- 
ern countries. Then, again, I see the great Caliph 
seated on his jewelled throne, and the Grand Vizier, 
Jaeffer, in attendance on him — looking lovingly upon 
the beautiful face of the Princess — the daughter of 
Haroun. Poor Jaeffer ! He came to look too lovingly 
upon the beautiful face of the Princess ; and the great 
Caliph clipped off his head with a cimeter. This is 
history I am telling you now ; and this really and truly 
happened. It has made a great blot upon the fame 
of Haroun al Raschid, who, — for all this, was the most 
brilliant and the justest monarch of those centuries ; 
and he lived in the age of Charlemagne. 

Well — it was in the time of this great Caliph Ha- 
roun al Raschid, and in his great city of Bagdad, that a 
porter named Hindbad, very poor, and very tired, and 
very hungry, — one day sat at the gate of a rich, tall 
palace, snuffing the odors of the rich dinner that was 
being served within. 

The by-standers told him he was at the door of the 
great traveller and merchant — Sindbad. But it did not 
console the poor fellow to know that the rich man had 
a name almost like his own. 


ABOUT OLD STORY-TELLERS. 


<5o 


Alas ! *’ said he (nobody says “Alas ! ” now, whatever 
happens), “Alas, why has Allah, the great God, given to 
this man plenty, and to poor Hindbad only poverty?” 

Some one of the by-standers — very likely the door- 
keeper — reported 
this speech of the 
poor fellow to Sind- 
bad ; and Sindbad or- 
dered him brought in, 
and gave him a place 
at his table, and then 
and there commenced 
the story of those 
dangerous voyages of 
his, and of those trials 
and labors, which had 
made him rich. I sup- 
pose he wanted to 
make poor Hindbad 
understand that riches do not fall from the clouds, and 
that very many who enjoy them have come to them 
through long struggles and dangers — if nothing worse. 

Sindbad said that he was the son of a merchant ; and 
that on his first voyage he was one day becalmed beside 
what seemed a great green island : and that he, with 
several of the crew, went ashore, and after wandering 
about some time suddenly felt the land quake and heave 
under them. This was not strange ; for what they had 
taken to be an island was in reality only the back of 
a huge sea-monster sleeping on the water. Before he 
had fairly rolled over and gone down, most of the men 
made their escape in the boat ; but poor Sindbad was 



Street of Bagdad. 


) 


THE ARABIAN NIGHTS. 6l 

not quick enough, so he was overwhelmed in the sea. 
Luckily he seized upon a log as he rose, and clambering 
upon it, floated upon it a day and a night, and at last 
was swept into the bay of a real island where he had 
many adventures, but ended with getting home safely, 
and with the wonderful recovery of all the goods he 
had taken out in his ship. 

On his second voyage he was cast away again ; and 
upon the island where he landed he came upon one of 
those wonderful Roc’s eggs of which a picture was 
given you a little way back. Of course he had no 
idea what it could be ; but while he gazed upon it in 
wonderment the sky was darkened, and the mother-bird 
came sailing to her nest. He was so near the egg, that 
the great Roc (which was large enough to carry off an 
elephant in its claws) sat down upon her egg and poor 
Sindbad. He made himself as small as he could ; and 
then with some cord he had in his pocket — what does 
he do but lash himself to the ankle, or to one of the 
toes, of the great bird ! 

Was there ever such a bird } To tell truth, I don’t 
think Sindbad’s story is very good authority ; but there 
was an old Venetian traveller named Marco Polo, who 
went all across Asia some years later than the time of 
Haroun, and he says he heard of the Roc ; and people 
told him it could carry up an elephant and a rhinoceros 
together. But then, Marco Polo, though he was a real 
traveller, told some stories that it is hard to believe. 

Why did Sindbad tie himself to the leg of the great 
Roc ? The truth is, there was nothing to eat on the 
great plain where the Roc’s nest was ; and he was 
so badly off, that he thought he could not fare worse in 


62 


ABOUT OLD STORY-TELLERS. 


going wherever the Roc might take him. He doesn’t 
seem to have been at all afraid that the Roc would 
devour him ; and he had as good a reason for wishing 
to change his place of residence as many people have 
now every May-day. 



The Roc, when it flew, took him up, — so high, he 
could see no ground : he was swept through the clouds, 
and great clouds were below him. Then at last, 
swooping down in great circles over sea and over land, 
the Roc alighted in a barren valley hemmed in on all 
sides by high mountains. From the account Sindbad 
gave of it, it must have been very much like the famous 
valley of Yosemite in California. Yet I don’t think it 
was the Yosemite. However, he untied himself hastily ; 
and presently after, the Roc, having taken up a huge 
serpent in his beak, soared away. 

Sindbad found himself without food. There were 
no houses in this mountain valley ; there were no 
fruits ; huge serpents in plenty, and — strange to say 
— great store of diamonds scattered all over the sun 


THE ARABIAN NIGHTS. 


63 


face of the ground. But all around him the cliffs were 
so steep that there was no hope of climbing away ; least 
of all, if he should load himself with diamonds. It was 
a dreadful night he passed after his air-voyage tied to 
the leg of the Roc. There was no shelter except in a 
crevice of the cliffs — too narrow for the great serpents 
to creep in. The next day, as he wandered about, faint 
with hunger, he suddenly felt a shock of something fall- 
ing on the ground near him ; and, on looking carefully, 
he found that this falling matter was nothing less than 
big rounds of uncooked beef. He saw, too, that these 
fragments of meat were directly pounced upon by gi- 
gantic eagles, which swooped down and bore them off. 
He remembered then to have heard of some distant val- 
ley where the diamond-collectors took this way to gather 
jewels they could not otherwise reach — the diamonds 
sticking fast in the flesh, and the eagles bearing all to 
their nests in the cliffs, where the merchants found 
them. Marco Polo, if I remember rightly, tells this 
story too. 

Seeing how the case stood, Sindbad gathered a great 
package of the finest diamonds to be found — tied the 
package to his girdle in front ; then tied a round of 
beef to his girdle behind, and lay down flat, with his 
face to the ground. He trusted that some great eagle 
would lift him, and the meat, and diamonds, and all. 

And there came a mammoth bird, — not so large as a 
roc, by any means, — but yet equal to the work. Slowly 
but surely, Sindbad was borne up by it from the earth — 
borne away to the cliffs, and dropped into a nest of 
young eaglets, where the diamond-searchers were in 
waiting to snatch the jewels. 


64 


ABOUT OLD STORY-TELLERS. 


You may be sure they were very much surprised to 
see Sindbad, and were astonished when he showed them 
the treasures in his package. However, he gave them 
a generous share, — visited their city, saw the king, — as 
was usual for strangers, — and finally sailed away with 
a rich load of jewels for home. And this was the end 
of his second voyage. 

On his third voyage, this unlucky Sindbad was 
wrecked again. He saves his life, indeed, and with 
a few of his comrades wanders upon the shores of a 
strange country, where at last he enters the doors of 
a great palace. It must have been a rude palace ; for 
there were bones of men upon the floor, — fresh bones 
too ; and a great fire in the palace chimney-place, and 
fearful-looking spits. Sindbad and the men with him 
crouched in the corner ; and the walls around them 
shook, as the master of the palace came stalking in. 
He had a horrible figure. If you have ever read 
Homer, you must remember the great one-eyed Cy- 
clop, who lived in a cavern, and devoured the compan- 
ions of Ulysses. Well, this monstrous creature, into 
whose palace Sindbad had wandered, was one-eyed, like 
the Cyclop, and far more hideous to look upon. His 
teeth were long and pointed, and his ears were like the 
ears of an elephant, and flapped upon his shoulders. 

You may be sure he saw these castaway sailors with 
that great red eye of his ; and presently coming up and 
pinching one or two between his fingers, to find the fat- 
test of them, he picked out one ; then he lifted him 
as a cook would lift a partridge, and thrust him through 
with one of those cruel spits. The sailors knew then 
what the fire meant, and the men’s bones ; and I sus* 


THE ARABIAN NIGHTS, 


65 


pect Sindbad must have been glad he was in so lean 
condition ; for he had been one of the first this mon- 
strous creature had taken in hand. 

Having eaten, the monster slept, — they generally 
sleep pretty soundly, — though his snoring was some- 
thing dreadful to listen to. Sindbad and the men with 
him crept slily out from their corner, while the monster 
slept ; and, putting eight or nine of the iron spits in the 
fire until they were well heated, thrust them all at once 
into the one eye that was in the middle of the giant’s 
forehead. Then they all made for the shore with as 
much haste as they could. They put together rafts out 
of timbers lying there — dreading every moment lest 
the blinded giant should find his way to them. They 
finished their rafts, however, and had pushed off, when, 
with a howling that echoed all along the shores, they 
saw the giant striding toward them, — led by another, 
and followed by some half-dozen others. In the Greek 
story — as you will find when you come to read it — 
there were only three of the Cyclops family — which 
seems quite enough. This company of Eastern giants 
did not reach the shore till Sindbad and his friends had 
paddled a long way off : but they were not safe ; for the 
giants began pelting them with stones, and battered 
their rafts in pieces. Somehow Sindbad saved himself 
upon a log, and drifted into a tar-away bay, where he 
landed with one or two companions. He had a won- 
derful escape here from huge serpents, who devoured 
the men with him ; and, from a tall tree into which he 
had climbed, he sees a ship off shore, and waves his 
turban, and is seen, and is taken off, and carried to his 
home again, — managing somehow to carry a great deal 


66 


ABOUT OLD STORY-TELLERS, 


of money back with him from this voyage, as he did 
from all the others. 

He makes seven voyages in all, of which he tells the 
story in seven succeeding days, to that old porter 
Hindbad, of whom I spoke in the beginning. And he 
not only tells the stories to Hindbad; but he gives 
him a bag of golden coin every time he has finished a 
story of a voyage. I presume that Hindbad thought 
them very excellent stories, and would have dearly liked 
to hear more of them. 

And he is not the only one who has thought them 
good. I cannot tell you the half of his wonderful 
adventures. Once, when cast away, he comes, with the 
sailors who were saved with him, upon another Roc’s 
egg ; which his companions — never having seen one 
before — commence hewing in pieces. In a moment 
the air is darkened ; the great birds, whose nests these 
wanderers have disturbed, hang over them like a cloud ; 
and when they would escape by taking to their boats, 
the birds, like the great Cyclops, take huge rocks, and 
sailing in the air above the ships, drop their burden, 
and make a wreck of the vessels. 

That lucky Sindbad escapes, as he always manages to 
do ; but in the new lands to which he is floated upon a 
piece of the wreck, he finds one of the strangest of all 
his adventures. The trees are beautiful, and the streams 
of water ; there are sweet-smelling flowers too ; and in 
this country, which seems as if it were altogether only a 
pleasant garden, he meets an old man, with long white 
beard, and deep-set prying eyes, limping along by the 
bank of a stream. Sindbad, at the beckoning of this 
droll-looking old man, takes him on his shoulders to help 



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THE ARABIAN NIGHTS. 


69 


him across the stream. But no sooner is he upon Sind- 
bad’s back than his legs seem to grow long, and cling 
about the poor sailor, and his fingers stretch out into 
claws that hold him fast ; and he settles to his place 
upon Sindbad’s shoulders as if he grew there. Sindbad 
stoops for the old man to come down ; but the old man 
does not come down : instead of it, he chuckles, and 
gives Sindbad a punch in his ribs, and urges him to go 
forward. 

And forward this poor sailor of Bagdad is compelled 
to go ; over hill and brook, and through valleys, and past 
wide plains, — by noon, by night, — this terrible old Man 
of the Sea keeps his place, and comes near to choking 
Sindbad with the tightness of his hug. He makes Sind- 
bad stay when he would pluck fruit from the trees ; he 
warns him to go faster, when, through fatigue, he halts 
and trembles under this terrible load. 

Hindbad — being a porter — and used to carrying bur- 
dens on his shoulders, must have listened very wonder- 
ingly to this story of a load which could not be shaken 
off. Had it been a cask or a box, there would have been 
more hope ; but a burden in the shape of a man is a 
very hard thing to shake off. 

And how was Sindbad rid of him at last ? Why, one 
day (after he had carried the old man a week or more), 
he saw some empty gourds lying on the ground ; and, 
taking one of them, he pressed the juice — from some 
of the delicious grapes that grew all around — into it, and 
then hung his gourd upon a tree. The juice turned into 
wine after some days, as grape-juice is very apt to do. 
And when he came to drink it, — being faint with the 
continual burden of that horrible Man of the Sea, — ■ 


70 


ABOUT OLD STORY-TELLERS. 


the old man snuffed the wine, and beckoned to Sindbad 
to give him a taste of it. And he took another, and an- 
other, and another taste, — as wine-drinkers when once 
started are inclined to do, — until at last Sindbad felt the 
old man loosening his hold : and he lay down with him ; 
and the hold was loosened more and more, until the old 
man had fallen off from his shoulders in a drunken sleep. 
Then Sindbad seized whatever weapon he could find, — 
stones, I presume, — and made an end of his tormentor. 

Sindbad does not say so in his story ; but I think this 
old Man of the Sea belonged to a dreadful tribe called 
Badd-Habbidtz, stray members of which are found very 
often in the East nowadays, and sometimes in the West. 
If you ever meet one, I advise you not to let him get 
settled down on your shoulders. 

Sindbad prospers again when once he has shaken 
off this obstinate old man : he makes friends in that 
beautiful country ; gathers great cargoes of tea and 
spices, and sails back with new and richer stores than 
ever to the dear old City of Bagdad. 

There he lived always afterward in a princely house 
(if we may believe those who made the pictures for the 

Arabian Nights ” ), and was befriended by the Caliph 
Haroun al Raschid, who certainly lived and did a great 
many wonderful things — whatever may be true of the 
voyaging Sindbad and of the porter Hindbad. 

Bagdad, too, was a real city, and is a city still. You 
will find it on your maps of Asia, lying a little eastward 
of the great sandy wastes of Arabia, upon the banks 
of the river Tigris, which is a branch of the river 
Euphrates, on which, as tradition says, once bloomed 
the Garden of Paradise. 


THE ARABIAN NIGHTS. 


71 


Sindbad must have sailed on his great voyages down 
through the Tigris, — then through the Euphrates, and 
so out into the Persian Gulf. You can go there now 
by the same track over 
which Sindbad carried 
home his treasures. But 
I fear you would be dis- 
appointed in the city. 

Y ou would find low houses 
and narrow streets, and a 
Turkish governor in red 
woollen cap in place of the 
great Caliph. You would 
find the palaces and grand 
temples and hanging gar- 
dens ruined, and only be 
reminded of the days of 
Arabian Nights by the 
blazing noonday heats, by 
the camels coming in with their burdens, by the waving 
palm-trees, and by the tomb, which is still standing, of 
the beautiful Zobeide, who was the favorite wife of the 
great Caliph. 

For my part, I am content to stay away from the 
Turkish city of Bagdad of to-day. I am sure that the 
sight of its outlying valleys — whatever herds of sheep 
and cattle might be feeding on them — would not be 
equal to the image I have in mind when I read the Vis- 
ion of Mirza ; ^ and in the city itself, I am quite sure that 
I should miss the great stretch of brilliant streets — 

1 I counsel all my young readers to find and read the delightful paper of Addi- 
son’s in the Spectator, with this title. 



Ruined Temple at Bagdad. 


/ 


72 ABOUT OLD STORY-TELLERS, 

the jewelled palaces — the troops of laden camels — the 
flashing cimeters — the rustle of silks — the fair Per- 
sians — the veiled princesses — the Shahs and Schah- 
riars — the delightful Zobeides, — which come into my 
thought when I read the “ Arabian-Nights ” stories of 
the times of the magnificent Haroun al Raschid. 




IV. 

GOLDSMITH’S WORK. 

:>! Vicar and his Family. 

W HO, pray, has not read that delightful old story 
about a certain Dr. Primrose, who was Vicar 
of Wakefield } Was it in the Sunday-school library 
that we first came upon it ? — or was it on the book- 
shelves of some darling old aunt who kept it as one of 
the treasures of her school-days } For it is an old book : 
our grandmothers read it, and may-be our great-grand- 
mothers ; and I think it is quite certain that our grand- 
children will read it too. 

There are skipping-places in it, to be sure ; such are 
some of the long talks about second marriages, which 
don’t concern young people much ; and such is the page- 
long speech about kings and republics and free govern- 
ment : but with these taken out, or skipped over, — as 
well as the Greek, which has no business there, — what 
a delightful story it is ! 

One grows into the kindliest sort of companionship 
with the good Dr. Primrose and his family, and follows 

73 



74 


ABOUT OLD STORY-TELLERS. 


their fortunes as if they were fortunes of his own, and 
never forgets them, — let him live as long as he may. 

Naturally we don’t think as much of Mrs. Primrose 
as we do of the Doctor ; but that happens in a good many 
families where we love to go. She is a little too proud 
of her daughters, — who are fine girls, both of them, — 
and a little too much bent upon holding up her head in 
the world. 



Mrs. Primrose's Fine Girls. 


Of course it is a very good thing to hold up one’s 
head, and better still to be able to do so with a clear 
conscience ; but we don’t like to encounter people who 
want to impress everybody they meet — with a notion 
of their great importance. There was a little of this in 
Mrs. Primrose, but not a bit of it in the Doctor. 

He was of good fortune when the story opens ; and 
besides those two daughters, Sophia and Olivia, had two 
sons, George and Moses, as well as a couple of younger 
boys, who don’t have much to do with the story ; and 
for aught that appears, they may be young boys some- 
where in England still. 


GOLDSMITH^S WORK. 


75 


Not much happens to interest one while the Doctor is 
comfortably rich. He says himself, that the most im- 
portant event of a twelvemonth was the moving from the 
blue chamber to the brown ; that surely would not con- 
cern young fellows who have no moving to do. The son 
George does, indeed, fall in love with a very nice girl, — 
Miss Wilmot, who has a snug fortune of her own ; and 
as Miss Wilmot has a strong fancy for George, it is 
counted a settled thing between them ; and, indeed, the 
marriage-day was fixed. 

But Dr. Primrose (I call him Doctor because Mr. 
Jenkinson, an important character in the story, always 
did, and I am sure if he had lived among our American 
colleges he would have been a doctor) — Dr. Primrose, 
I say, could not get over his love for talk about the 
wickedness of second marriages, in which Mr. Wilmot, 
the father of the charming Arabella, did not agree with 
him ; and as they waxed warm one day, Mr. Wilmot — I 
dare say, getting the worst of the argument — let slip the 
fact that the Doctor was a beggar, — since the business 
man who had been intrusted with his property had 
become bankrupt, and had fled from the country. 

This was an ugly thing for Mr. Wilmot to say, and a 
rough way of pushing his cause ; but it was none the 
less true. And this fact and the quarrel broke off the 
match ; and son George, in high dudgeon, set off to seek 
his fortune otherwheres. 

Nor was this the worst : the good Doctor had to leave 
his fine house, and take a poor parish in a distant part of 
the country, with a cottage so small that there could be 
no moving every spring from the blue chamber to the 
brown. There were no chambers to move into. But 


76 


ABOUT OLD STORY-TELLERS. 


out of this change of home, and the griefs and trials that 
came with it, grew all those events which have made the 
history of the old Vicar so charming a one that it has 
been conned and read in ten thousand households all 
over the world. 

Can I tell you what those events were in a half-hour 
of talk } 

Ah, well ! it will be spoiling one of the tenderest of 
stories ; and yet I will try to catch so much of the pith 
and of the point of it as shall make you eager to taste 
for yourself, and ‘‘at first hands,” the delicate humor 
and the charming flow of that old-fashioned novel of the 
Vicar of Wakefield. I call it a novel, though it is as 
unlike as possible to the work that our modern novel- 
writers do. 

Mr. Burchell ana the Squire. 

Mrs. Primrose — poor woman — who had loved to puf 
on airs in her large house, did not get over the love in 
the small house. It is a love that it is hard for anybody 
to get over, if they begin once to encourage it. But the 
Doctor, good soul, laughed at her grand dressing and 
her eagerness to show off her daughters in the old 
finery. She even aims at something like style in going 
to church, by rigging up the two plough-horses so that 
one should carry the boy Moses and herself with the 
two little ones, and the other make a mount for the two 
daughters. Of course it was but a sorry figure they 
cut, and the Doctor had his laugh at them, though it was 
on a Sunday. Yet when a middle-aged woman has an 
eye for “ style,” it is not easy to laugh her out of it ; and 


GOLDSMITH'S WORK. 


77 


Mrs. Primrose was set on to this and a good many other 
like manoeuvres by a hope she had of making conquest 
of a certain Squire Thornhill, — who was their landlord 
and the great man of the neighborhood, — and of match- 
ing him with one of her daughters. He was of fair age, 
lived freely in a grand house, rode to the hounds, and 
sent presents of game to the Primrose girls, — much to 



Mrs. Primrose’s "Style." 


the delight of their mamma ; who banters Olivia specially 
on these attentions, and wonders the Doctor — simple 
soul — cannot see through it all. She has even hopes 
of capturing the Squire’s chaplain — or the man who 
passes as chaplain — for her daughter Sophia ; who is a 
sweeter girl than Olivia, — though not so coquettish and 
not taking so much after the mother. 


78 


ABOUT OLD STORY-TELLERS. 


They say in the neighborhood that Squire Thornhill 
is indebted for his easy way of living to the bounty of 
an eccentric uncle, — not much older than himself, but 
m.ore grave, living much in London, not well known 
down in the country, but spoken of always with very 
much awe. 

The Primrose family, moreover, make the acquaintance 
of a Mr. Burchell, — whom they meet first, I think, upon 
the highway; and who does good service by saving 
Sophia from drowning, when she had fallen, one day, 
into the river that ran near by. He is a shabby-genteel 
person in appearance, but well instructed, and can talk 
by the hour with the Doctor about his hobbies ; and he 
brings little gifts for the boys ; indeed, if he had been 
rich and better-looking, Mrs. Primrose would have been 
half-disposed to favor him as a proper match for Sophia 
— provided the chaplain should fail her. 

A curious thing is, that Mr. Burchell doesn’t talk in 
the highest terms of Squire Thornhill ; and another 
curious thing is, that he avoids any occasion of meeting 
him at the Vicar’s cottage — all which Madame Primrose 
places to the account of the poor man’s jealousy. Maybe 
so ; but the Doctor thought well of him and of his talk, 
and so did Moses and the boys ; and it always seemed 
to me that Sophia — though she never said so — looked 
kindly on him, and was not so much disturbed by his 
lack of fine clothes as Olivia or her mother. 

They were all flustered and provoked, however, when 
they learned, in an accidental way, that Burchell, by 
some talk and letters of his, had prevented the two girls 
from carrying out a plan they had formed of going up 
to London with a couple of lady friends of Squire 


GOLDSMITH’S WORK. 


79 


Thornhill’s. These town ladies had been down to the 
country, and paid a visit to the Vicarage, very much to 
the delight of Madame Primrose, who could never have 
done with admiring their fine feathers and silks. It 
would be a splendid thing for the dear girls to go up to 
London with them ! 

The Doctor did not, indeed, think quite so highly of 
these town ladies ; but what business had Mr. Burchell 
to interfere, and by his misrepresentations to defeat 
what would have been such a pleasure to the girls? 
’Twas a shabby intermeddling in his family affairs ; and 
he told Mr. Burchell so with some warmth. And Mr. 
Burchell was warm too ; and what business had the 
Doctor to be prying into the contents of private letters 
of his ? In short, they made a sharp family quarrel of 
it with Mr. Burchell, and Burchell took his stick and 
walked away. This was the last they saw of him for 
a long time. 

Did Sophia possibly look after him with a little 
yearning and repenting? I used to ask myself that 
question when I read the story in my young days ; but 
I don’t think she did — certainly not at the moment. 

Well, the Doctor’s money affairs were not getting on 
well : I think Madame Primrose and her love for good 
style had something to do with it. Good style, as it is 
called, has very much to do then, and always, with — not 
getting on well. 

The good folks of the family had sent Moses off to 
the Fair to make sale of the colt ; but Moses was horri- 
bly cheated, and came back with only a gross of green 
spectacles — of which, you may be sure, he never heard 
the last. The good Doctor thought to mend matters by 


80 


ABOUT OLD STORY-TELLERS. 


taking the only remaining horse himself. The rogues 
would never cheat him: but they did, and very badly 
too ; for he brought back only a worthless bit of paper, 
which was a draft on Neighbor Flamborough, who had 
two bouncing daughters, — one of whom Moses was 
tender upon. The Vicar had taken this draft from the 
man Jenkinson, who had talked Greek with the Doctor, 
and praised a book he had written, and so made the 
good man believe that he, — Jenkinson, was the worthi- 
est and most benevolent creature in the world. 

Moses had the laugh now. But it was no laughing 
time for the family : they were growing poorer and 
poorer. Mrs. Primrose’s “style” was getting uncomfort- 
ably pinched ; and the match with the Squire didn’t get 
on : so she thought to spur his attentions by setting up a 
new claimant for Miss Olivia, in Farmer Williams, who 
lived hard by. This had not gone very far, when, one 
day, the boys ran in, crying out, — “ Olivia is gone ! ” 

And so she had — in a coach : it was a runaway of a 
very bad kind. Was Burchell the criminal, or who } 
The old gentleman seized his pistols, and would have 
made after the wretch, but his wife and poor weeping 
Sophy quieted him. 

It came out shortly after, that Thornhill was the man ; 
and that he had made a mock marriage, and had made 
two or three such before. And yet the villain had the 
daring to call upon the Doctor with explanations ; but the 
good man blazed upon him with all the rage of injured 
innocence. The Squire was cool ; for Dr. Primrose 
owed him large debts, which there was no means of 
paying. 

Olivia found her way back, broken-hearted, and was 


GOLDSMITH^ S WORK. 


8i 



warmly greeted by the father, though she met only a 
half-welcome from Mrs. Primrose. 

It came to a prison, at last, for the good Vicar ; for in 
those days people who could not or would not pay their 
debts were clapped into prisons. The family of the 
good man would not leave him, but journeyed up to the 
town where the jail lay — though it was winter weather, 
the ground covered in snow, and poor Olivia just recov- 


Going to Prison. 

ering from a slow fever. The parishioners of the Doctor 
would, indeed, have snatched him from the keeping of 
the officers of the law, as they set out on their journey ; 
but the good Vicar in his earnest way checked them, and 
bade them remember that without law there could be no 
justice, and they must respect what the law commanded. 


82 


ABOUT OLD STORY-TELLERS. 


Whal Happened in Prison. 

For a long time Dr. Primrose lay in that dreary jail ; 
his family paying him frequent visits, and he by kindly 
talk winning upon the company of his fellow-prisoners 

— among whom happened to be that very Jenkinson who 
had so deceived him on his visit to the horse-fair, but 
who now at last seemed repentant. 

Surely it was a very sorry time for the poor Primrose 
family : the father in prison for debts he could find no 
means to pay ; the oldest son a wanderer — none knew 
where ; Olivia a poor disgraced creature ; and to add to 
the sum of troubles, it is reported that the lawless 
Squire Thornhill is to marry the charming Miss Wilmot, 
who had been once the promised bride of the poor wan- 
dering George Primrose. This seemed enough to break 
down all faith in that Providence whose overwatching 
care the good Vicar had always preached. Yet still 
further griefs were in store : Sophia — poor Sophia — 
in one of her walks into the country, where she hoped 
to catch some new strength and bloom, was stolen away 

— gone, none knew whither. And, as if to crown all, 
the wandering vagabond George returns — not with 
honors, but a prisoner, with shackles upon his limbs. 
He has heard of the wrong done his poor sister Olivia ; 
in his anger, he has challenged Squire Thornhill to 
mortal combat ; he has resisted the servants of that 
base master, — has cut one down with his sword. 

Indeed, it is a sorry group in that prison : the son a 
felon ; the Doctor a hopeless debtor ; Olivia disgraced 
and broken-hearted ; Sophia gone ! 


GOLDSMITH^S WORK. 


S3 


That was the place in this old story for tears — if 
anybody had them ; and a good many did have them ; 
and I have no doubt will have them in years to come. 
But we fellows didn’t stop there — for all the crying. 
We felt sure something better was to happen. And it 
did, — it did. 

First of all, Sophia was brought back, rescued ; and 
who do you think brought her back } Why, Mr. Bur- 
chell, — old seedy Burchell ; and the family — even to 
Mrs. Primrose — cannot help thanking the man, not- 
withstanding his shabby clothes. 

Mr. Jenkinson, too, proves a friend at last — is ready 
to swear that the marriage of Olivia to Squire Thornhill 
was not a mock marriage at all, but a real marriage ; for 
he himself had brought the priest who went through the 
ceremony. 

The good Doctor was enraptured at this ; and Mrs. 
Primrose went up and kissed poor, shrinking Olivia — 
for the first time. (I never liked Mrs. Primrose over- 
much.) 

After this. Miss Arabella Wilmot comes in to see the 
poor Vicar, and is much taken aback to find George 
there : she blushes, and is disturbed ; for, to tell truth, 
she has never loved any one else ; and when occasion 
permitted, I dare say she told him so ; for they were 
hand in hand, in a corner, before much time had passed. 

Squire Thornhill came in, — for what reason I don’t 
know exactly, — but got hard looks from everybody ; 
most of all from Mr. Burchell, whom he seemed to fear 
greatly. 

Can you fancy why he should — It was all clear 
enough presently; for this Mr. Burchell — old, seedy 


84 


ABOUT OLD STORY-TELLERS. 


Burchell — was none other than the famous and wealthy 
and eccentric Sir William Thornhill, on whose favor the 
reckless young squire was dependent. However, the 
uncle let his nephew off easily, but compelled him to 
acknowledge publicly his marriage with Miss Olivia. 

Then came old father Wilmot, with the story that the 
man of business who had run away with the Vicar’s 
fortune had been captured, and there was good chance 
that all his property would be restored. George, too, 
would be cleared from imprisonment : at least. Sir 
William Thornhill said he would bring it about; and 
nobody doubted that he would. 

Of course the Primrose family had now reason to be 
happy ; and they all looked so except Sophia, who wore 
a very sad countenance. The truth is, when Mr. Bur- 
chell had brought her back to her father, the good 
Doctor — knowing her preserver only as Mr. Burchell — 
had told him in his gratitude, that, as he had rescued 
her, he deserved to possess her, — to which Mr. Burchell 
had not made much reply. 

But now Mr. Burchell — that is. Sir William Thorn- 
hill, — with all the dignity that should belong to a great 
baronet, said that he was glad to see prosperity restored 
to this Primrose family; — that he had a great respect 
for the good Doctor (he didn’t say any thing about Mrs. 
Primrose) ; — that he was glad to see so many happy 
faces about him, and that the only exceptions were the 
faces of Miss Sophia and Mr. Jenkinson. He thought 
Jenkinson deserved well of the Vicar ; and he pro- 
posed that the good man should give Sophia to him as 
a bride, and he himself, he said, would add a wedding 
portion of five hundred pounds. 


GOLDSMITH^S WORK. 


But Sophia’s face did not clear up at all : nay, there 
were angry tears in her eyes as she vowed with a pitiful, 
low voice — that she would not have Mr. Jenkinson at 
all, — never ! 

“Why, then,” said Sir William Thornhill, “I must 
take the dear girl myself ; ” and with that he snatched 
her to his arms. 

Could there be a prettier ending to that story of the 
Primroses } No wonder it charmed us ; no wonder it 
has charmed thousands. 

And what became of Moses Why, Moses married 
one of the bouncing Miss Flamboroughs, of course. 
And ril warrant you that Mrs. Primrose let everybody 
know, within twenty miles round, that her daughter 
became Lady Thornhill ; and I will warrant further, that 
Sir William never took to his mother-in-law very 
strongly, and never enjoyed her gooseberry-wine so 
much — as when he drank it outside her own house. 

Poor Goldy. 

And was there really a Dr. Primrose who told this 
story about his own family, and about the vanities of his 
wife, and who married his daughter to Mr. Burchell — 
otherwise known as Sir William Thornhill } 

No — no — no ! 

It is as little true of any one, as that Master Aladdin 
found a lamp which worked the wonders we read of in 
the chapter that went before this. 

The person who really told this story of Dr. Primrose 
was an Irishman, of the name of Goldsmith, who used 
to be talked of among those who knew him best as 


86 


ABOUT OLD STORY-TELLERS. 


“poor Goldy.” He was a short, thick-set man, marked 
with old traces of small-pox, with a quick, clear black 
eye, and head almost bald. 

Among his friends was the famous painter Sir 
Joshua Reynolds, who made a 
picture of him, from which 
most of the engravings are 
made, and which I am sure was 
not a little flattered. I give it 
to you here. 

Leslie, the painter, said he 
saw in it all the genius that 
went to the “Vicar of Wake- 
fleld,” and the “ Deserted Vil- 
lage ; ” and I dare say Sir 
Joshua Reynolds painted it (as he should have done) 
with the memory of all the best things poor Goldy 
had done, quickening his skill, and lightening up his 
touches on the canvas. Without this knowing and 
feeling of a man’s inner life, 
good portraits are never made. 

I said that Goldsmith was 
nearly bald-headed, and he so 
appears in Reynolds’s picture ; 
but it was the custom of that 
day — the latter part of the 
last century — to wear wigs ; 
and Goldsmith almost always 
wore a wig. 

And now you shall see what 
his quizzical friend Bunbury made of his face, with 
the wig above it, and with his upper lip, which was very 




GOLDSMITH’S WORK, 


87 


protruding, making a show that must have provoked 
Goldsmith; yet it was said to be very like him. He 
played a great many games of cards with his friend 
Bunbury, — of which game he was always over-fond ; 
but I think he would never have forgiven that friend 
if he had known that we now, more than a century later, 
should be looking at it, and calling it a fair picture 
of him. 

As he loved cards and gaming, so he loved wine over- 
much, and was often the worse for it. I don’t mean to 
say that he went so far as to make a sot of himself, but 
that he lingered often and often over tavern-tables when 
he might have been doing better things. And remember 
in excuse for him, that he lived in days when almost 
everybody drank wine in taverns, and when even that 
great man Dr. Johnson — who was also a friend of Gold- 
smith’s — sometimes drank so much as to forget himself, 
and to make his great figure reel along the walk on the 
way to his chambers. 

Dr. Johnson was the great literary character of that 
day (it was in the reign of George II. and George 
III.), and wrote the best Dictionary of the English Lan- 
guage — until Dr. Webster made a better one; and it 
was through this very Dr. Sam Johnson, that the 
story of Dr. Primrose, I have told you of, found its way 
first to the printer’s hands. 

You would like to know how it happened ; and it is a 
thing you ought to know. Well — one day. Dr. Johnson, 
being at dinner with Mrs. Thrale, who was a great friend 
of Johnson’s, received a message from poor Goldy, say- 
ing that he was in distress, and “would the Doctor call 
round and see him } ” 


88 


ABOUT OLD STORY-TELLERS. 


Goldy was living, at that time, in Wine-Office Court, 
near Fleet Street ; and there the Doctor went to see 
him, having sent a guinea by the messenger to relieve 
any pressing trouble. Goldy had used the guinea to 
buy (among other things) a bottle of wine, and was 
sitting over it when the Doctor came in. 



Goldsmith’s Lodgings. 


“ I put the cork in the bottle,” says the Doctor, “ and 
begged him to be calm.” Then he learned that his 
landlady was threatening him for his rent, and that the 
sheriffs were ready to pounce upon him. He took a 
manuscript from his drawer, and begged the Doctor to 
sell it for him. This was the Vicar of Wakefield — that 
delightful old story of which I have given you a glimpse. 

Dr. Johnson, seeing it had merit, — but not, I think, 
seeing all its merit — (for it is not much like Rasselas, 


GOLDSMITH'S WORK. 


89 


which was a story by Dr. Johnson, that it may be worth 
your while to read) went out with it, and sold it for sixty 
pounds. 

The bookseller who bought it thought so little of it, 
that the story lay in his drawer for fifteen months before 
it was given to the printer. It appeared finally in 1766, 
when Goldsmith was thirty-eight years old. The critics 
did not speak very well of the book at the first :■ some 
of them thought it worth their while to make fun of the 
Primrose family ; but it grew steadily in favor, month 
by month and year by year, and is now read all over the 
world. 

A great German, who was young when it first ap- 
peared, hit upon the tale some four years after, and read 
it with delight and admiration ; and seventy years later, 
when he read it again with renewed delight, he told a 
friend how much its first reading had to do with forming 
his education. This great German was Goethe. 

We told you that Goldsmith was in distress when he 
wrote the Vicar of Wakefield, and beset by poverty. 
He never outlived that sort of distress ; for though the 
booksellers have received thousands and thousands of 
pounds for that little book, only the first paltry sixty 
pounds ever went into the pockets of the author. 

I do not think he would ever have been rich, if he had 
received thousands for it. He never had the art of 
husbanding his moneys, and never knew how to spend 
them with judgment. His heart was easily touched by 
any story of suffering ; and he would give his last guinea 
to a begging woman in the street. He loved dearly, 
too, a good roistering tavern supper, where he could lift 
up his voice to a great roar of song ; and he paid for a 


90 


ABOUT OLD STORY-TELLERS. 


great many such suppers, from which richer men than 
he slunk away, and left him to the “reckoning.” He 
had a passion for gaming, too, — or, as we should say — 
gambling, of which I have already spoken. But, before 
we condemn him too much for this, let us remember 
that in that day, and in London, gambling was common 
in most of the respectable houses ; and the great orator 
Charles James Fox would lose, and did lose, as much as 
eleven thousand pounds at a single sitting. 

Another fancy — and a queer one — of poor Goldy’s, 
was his passion for dress. Looking back at Bunbury’s 
picture of him, you would never imagine that he should 
have a love for silk waistcoats, and velvet breeches, and 
ruffles, and plush coats. Yet nothing is more true ; and 
there are old bills of his still in existence, in which are 
set down in fair figures — and very long ones — what he 
paid for “ Ratteen surtout,” and “ Blue Velvet Suit,” and 
“Silk breeches,” and “Queen’s blue dress suit,” and 
“Princess stuff breeches.” 

Yet he was not — as we should say — a society man. 
He knew few ladies; he never married — never was 
near marrying. I cannot find, by any hint, that he ever 
loved any young woman better than any old one ; or 
that any young woman ever loved him tenderly. Indeed, 
his appearance could never have been very engaging ; 
and his manner in a mixed company was always some- 
what clownish. 

Mr. Boswell, who was a member of the same club with 
him, and a great friend of Dr. Johnson’s (whose biogra- 
phy he wrote), was much more of a society man, and 
much less of a man in every other way. He used to 
sneer at “poor Goldy ” and his over-fine clothes; and I 


GOLDSMITH^S WORK, 9 1 

think would never have been seen in the street with 
him, except that the great Dr. Johnson befriended Gold- 
smith, and patted him, in his bear-like way, upon the 
back. 


His Family and Death. 

I have said that no Dr. Primrose ever really lived ; 
but there were those who said that Goldsmith’s old 
father, who had been a clergyman in Ireland, and who 
died when the son was quite young, was in many things 
very like to Dr. Primrose. 

It was almost in the middle of Ireland that Goldsmith 
was born, — not far from Roscommon, and very near to 
Edgeworthtown — where lived, later, that good woman 
Maria Edgeworth, whom you also know by her stories, 
and to whose acquaintance I shall introduce you in a 
coming chapter of this little book. 

He has not the best of schooling in that little village, 
nor has the poor parish priest — his father — much 
money to spare. Later, the old gentleman gets a larger 
and richer parish, — just as Dr. Primrose did not, — and 
Oliver has a better chance. But he loves to make a 
song for village idlers, and to hear them roar it out at 
a tavern table, — better than to study. 

And, after his father’s death, he becomes more of 
a vagrant ; sometimes studying ; sometimes tutoring ; 
sometimes trading horses, — always selling one for less 
than he is worth, and always buying one for more than 
he is worth — as most people do. He has some bicker- 
ings with his mother, too, — who does not like vagrancy. 

At one time he goes away to Cork, and actually 


92 


ABOUT OLD STORY-TELLERS. 


engages place on a ship for America ; but this plan 
gets somehow upset. If he had come ! Do you think 
he would have written a “Deserted Village” and a 
“ Vicar of Wakefield ” over here ? Or would he have 
slipped into practical ways, and taught the violin, or 
kept a country tavern, or had an office in the Custom 
House } 

On one of his jaunts about the Irish country, he found 
himself belated one night in a village far from home ; 
and, inquiring after a public house, some wag directed 
him to a gentleman’s place, where Goldy went, — and 
ordered out his horse, — and fumed, — and put on im- 
portant airs, — and wanted the best supper that could 
be had ; and did not find out that he was making free 
with the home of a private gentleman until he asked 
for his bill next morning. Out of this little adventure 
grew afterward that charming play of “ She Stoops to 
Conquer,” which you may see now, from time to time, 
upon the stage ; and which is better worth seeing than 
most of the comedies of to-day. 

By the help of a rich uncle, he gets a footing after- 
ward at college; later he goes to study medicine at 
Edinboro’ ; and thence he goes over — sent by the same 
good uncle — to Leyden in Holland, where was a famous 
university. 

Who knows but he might have made a great Doctor, 
if he had kept by his chances there ? But he doesn’t : 
we presently find him wandering about Europe — sleep- 
ing in stables, in religious houses, in small inns — pay- 
ing his way sometimes by the music he made with the 
flute he took with him ; and perhaps it was over-use of 
this that made that great upper lip of his project so 
much as you see it does in Bunbury’s caricature. 


GOLDSMITH^ S WORK. 


'73 


I suppose nobody ever went through Europe, seeing 
so much, with so little money, as Goldsmith. You will 
see traces of this wandering in his poem of the ‘‘Trav- 
eller;” and here and there in the “Bee,” — which was 
another of his books ; and most of all, in the wanderings 
of George Primrose, in the “Vicar.” 

Coming to London again, he tried medicine, with 
velvet coats and big wig to help him ; but he never did 
much at medicine. He tried teaching ; but he was not 
steady enough and patient enough to get on well at this. 
Then he became proof-reader — that is to say, — he cor- 
rected the printed sheets for Dr. Richardson, a book- 
seller, who had written novels — one of which, called 
“ Clarissa,” was thought superb, and everybody read it. 
Women would go a block 
out of their way to see the 
dear and famous Dr. Rich- 
ardson. And now scarce 
anybody knows about “ Cla- 
rissa;” but all the world 
knows the “Vicar.” 

After this, he kept by 
books ; writing some which 
brought him more money 
than the Primrose story, but 
not nearly so well known 
now. He wrote so well that 
he was asked to join the club, — a very famous club, 
where he used to meet Burke (another great Irishman 
and an orator), and Beauclerc, and Boswell, and Dr. 
Johnson, and Sir Joshua Reynolds, and Garrick the 
great actor. With some one or two of these, he might 



Goldy, Johnson, and Boswell. 


94 


ABOUT OLD STORY-TELLERS. 


have been seen over and over in those times, walking 
along Fleet Street in London. 

They all liked him ; and there were times when they 
all laughed at him. He never would have made a Mr. 
Worldly-Wiseman, such as comes into Bunyan’s story of 
the Pilgrim. He was always at “sixes and sevens.” 
He was petulant in his talk often, and he had vanities 
that crept into his manner ; but his vices were such as 
disposed one more to laugh than to be shocked by 
them. And in all he wrote, he was so simple, and pure, 
and healthy, and withal there was such play of delightful 
humor, and all of his stories were so tenderly told, that 
people loved him for his books, and keep on loving him 
for them to-day. 

Poor and lonely in his chamber, he only knew cheer 
when he was with some favorite member of the club, or 
with some humble companion at a coffee-room table. 
Poor and lonely he died ; with few friends about him, 
— neither mother, nor wife, nor brother, nor sister near 
him when his great black eye grew dim, and the light of 
it passed away forever. 

The great statesman Edmund Burke, when the tid- 
ings of the death came to him, burst into tears. Sir 
Joshua Reynolds, when the messenger came to say 
Goldy was dead — laid his brushes down — shut up his 
studio, and gave the day up to his grief. Burly old 
Dr. Johnson was touched keenly, and mourned his death 
as he had mourned for very few. 

They buried him in tne Temple Church-yard, quietly ; 
but among the mourners were men so highly and so 
worthily known, that the presence of one of them was 
worth more to the fame and memory of poor Goldy than 


GOLDSMITH WORK. 


95 


would have been the presence of a host of gilded 
carriages, and the blaze of idle ceremony. 

There is a tablet in honor of this writer of the Prim- 
rose story, in Westminster Abbey ; and upon it a Latin 
inscription — by Dr. Johnson, with one line in it, I dare 
say you have seen somewhere : — 

Nullum qiLod tetigit non ornavit. 

It was so aptly said, that it has been said of many others 
since ; but never said so truly as of poor Goldy. 

No one knows just where he lies buried in Temple 
Church-yard, for there is no record. But they have 
placed a stone with his name upon it on the north side 
of the Temple Church, a little west of the master’s 
house ; and there visitors go every Sunday — strangers 
from all countries — men, and women, and children, to 
see the stone which bears the name of the man who 
told such a winning story of a poor Vicar and his family. 

He will never be forgotten. He deserves to be 
remembered. 



V. 


GULLIVER SWIFT. 

Some Queer Lillie People. 

HUNDRED and fifty years ago, or thereabout, 



while George the First was King of Great Brit- 
ain, there was a story of some voyages printed in Eng- 
land, which everybody read with a great deal of wonder. 

There never had been such voyages made before ; 
there never had been such people seen as this voyager 
had seen. 

A man who said his name was Richard Sympson 
sent the story of these voyages to the printer or pub- 
lisher, and told him, and told the public, that he knew 
the man who wrote the story, and that he was living in 
Nottinghamshire in England, and that he was a friend 
of his, and connected with him on the mother’s side. 
And, besides this, he said that he was a truthful man, 
and that his neighbors believed what he said. He knew 
the house in which he had lived, too, and knew who his 
father was — which was not very strange, since he was 
connected with him, as I said, on the mother’s side. 


GULLIVER SWIFT. 


97 


The name of this voyager was Lemuel Gulliver ; and 
he was so much thought of among his neighbors (Mr. 
Sympson said), that it came to be a proverb among 
them, when any one told a thing that was very, very 
true, to add, — It’s as true as if Mr. Gulliver had said 
it.” 

Well, this Mr. Gulliver said he studied physic in 
Leyden, and married Mary Burton, who lived in New- 
gate Street, and that he got four hundred pounds in 
money by his wife. I don’t see any reason to doubt 
this. He went as surgeon on a good many ships ; but 
nothing happened to him very extraordinary, until he 
sailed in May, 1699, in the “Antelope,” for the South 
Seas. (I knew a ship, once, called the “Antelope.”) 
This “Antelope” was commanded by Capt. William 
Prichard ; but that doesn’t matter much, since Mr. Gul- 
liver doesn’t refer to Capt. Prichard once again. 

They had a very hard time of it, — a good many of the 
sailors dying off ; and on the 5 th of November — a little 
while before Thanksgiving Day in New England — the 
ship drove on a rock, and split. 

Ships do so very often when they drive on rocks. 

Six of the men got clear, with Gulliver, and rowed 
until the wind upset the boat. The six men were 
drowned ; but Gulliver touched bottom, and walked a 
mile through the water till he reached land. Then 
being very tired, and, as he says, “ having taken half a 
pint of brandy aboard ship,” he was very sleepy, and lay 
down to doze. This about the brandy is, I dare say, 
not more than half true. 

He says he must have slept about nine hours, and 
when he waked he felt stiff, and couldn’t turn over. He 


9 ^ ABOUT OLD STORY-TELLERS. 

tried to lift his arm, but he . couldn’t. Presently he 
found out that there was a cord across his breast, and 
another across the middle of his body ; and then he 
found that his legs were tied, and his arms ; and it 
seemed to him — though he couldn’t tell certainly — 
that his hair was fastened to the ground. This was all 
strange enough ; but it was stranger yet when he felt 
something walk up over his left leg, and come on across 



Six Inches High. 


his body, almost to his chin, so that by turning his eyes 
down, he could see a little fellow, about six inches high, 
formed just like a man, with a bow and arrows in his 
hand. One would have been enough ; but when he felt 
forty more walking over his legs and arms, and pulling 
themselves up by his hair, he roared out, — as 1 think 
you and I would have done. 





Gulliver on Exhibition, 



GULLIVER SWIFT. 


lOI 


At this they all scampered ; and some of them hurt 
themselves badly by tumbling off his body, though this 
Mr. Gulliver did not know until some time afterward. 
The poor voyager, who was thus lying on his back, 
struggled a little, and so he came to get his left arm 
loose ; which was very lucky for him, because these little 
people, who were much frightened, began to shoot 
arrows at him, and would most certainly have put out 
his eyes if he had not covered them with his hand. 

But, by little and little, he was able to look about him, 
and saw there thousands and thousands of these queer 
small people in the fields around. 

Afterward, when he had made signs that he was 
hungry and thirsty, they brought him food, a wagon-load 
at a time, which he took up between his thumb and 
finger ; and their casks of wine, — no bigger than a tea- 
cup, — he emptied in a way that made them wonder. 
(Of course, if these people were only six inches high, 
their wine-casks must have been small in proportion ; 
every one must see the truth of that.) But these little 
people had put drugs in the wine, so that Mr. Gulliver 
slept very soundly after it, — so soundly that he didn’t 
know at all when they brought an immense cart or truck 
(which they used for dragging vessels), and slung him 
upon it ; and with fifteen hundred of the king’s horses 
drew him to town. There they chained him by one leg, 
near to the entrance of an immense temple, with a door 
four feet high — so that he was able to crawl under 
cover when he awoke. 

Of course all the little people round about came to 
see Mr. Gulliver, whom they called “The Man-Moun- 
tain ; ” and the king, who had a majestic figure, since he 


102 


ABOUT OLD STORY-TELLERS, 


was taller by half an inch than any of his subjects, 
appointed officers to show the Man-Mountain, and the 
officers in this way made a great deal of money out of 
Mr. Gulliver. Officers almost always make money out 
of somebody. 

He caught their language, after a time ; though they 
couldn’t have spoken louder than our crickets — if as 
loud. The name of this strange country was Liliput ; 
and Mr. Gulliver was introduced to all the distinguished 
people there, — at least he says so, — and has a good 
deal to say about the queen and the princesses, and how 
he amused them. Travellers are apt to. He helped 
them, too, very much ; and when a people living upon a 
neighboring island called Blefuscu threatened war, and 
collected a great fleet of vessels to attack the Lilipu- 
tians, Mr. Gulliver kindly waded over one morning, and, 
tying a cord to all the ships’ bows, drew them along 
after him, and gave them up to his imperial majesty of 
Liliput. He had to put on his spectacles, however, 
while he was in the water, to keep the Blefuscan 
soldiers — who were collected on the shores by thou- 
sands — from shooting out his eyes. 

The King of Liliput was, of course, delighted with 
this service of Mr. Gulliver, and made him a prince on 
the spot. He also thought it would be a good thing if 
Mr. Gulliver should, some day, wade across again, and 
drag over the rest of the enemy’s ships ; but the Eng- 
lishman did not think very well of this, and I suspect 
this difference led to a little coolness between him and 
the king. It is certain that a good many of the high 
officers took up a dislike of Mr. Gulliver, as well as some 
of the ladies of the court. The long and the short of it 


GULLIVER. SWIFT. 


103 


was, that he found himself out of place among the Lili- 
putians, and so went over afoot to the island of Blefuscu, 
where he soon was on very good terms with the emperor 
of that empire, though he had drawn away his ships. 

One day, however, Mr. Gulliver espied in the offing an 
English boat bottom side up, and by dint of wading and 
tugging, with the aid of several Blefuscan men-of-war, he 
brought it to land. There he repaired the boat, — the 
emperor kindly consenting, and furnishing a few hun- 
dred mechanics to aid him. Then he stocked the boat 
with provisions, taking some live sheep and cattle, and 
set off homeward. He ran great danger of being 
wrecked ; but, finally fell in with an English merchant 
vessel, — Capt. John Biddel, commander, — who kindly 
took him on board, and asked him how he happened to 
be at sea in a yawl ? 

Mr. Gulliver told him, and described the people he 
had been with. Capt. Biddel didn’t believe him, and 
thought him crazy. Whereupon Mr. Gulliver pulled 
some of the Blefuscan sheep and cattle out of his pocket, 
and showed them to him. 

Capt. Biddel couldn’t say any thing more. Mr. Gulli- 
ver arrived home safely ; found his wife well, and his 
boy Johnny (named after his uncle, who had left him 
some land at Epping) at the grammar school. 


Some Monstrous People. 

This same Mr. Gulliver made three or four more 
voyages, and always had the luck to fall in with most 
extraordinary people, — some of them being ninety feet 


104 ABOUT OLD STORY-TELLERS. 

high ; and he was for a considerable time in the waist- 
coat pocket of a farmer. 

Only imagine what the wheat must have been, and the 
pumpkins, and the green corn — where a farmer could 
quietly put a great traveller like Mr. Gulliver in his 
vest-pocket ! People get into farmers’ pockets in this 
country, — but not in that way. 

The potatoes in that land of Brobdingnag (for so the 
country was called) must have come up to Mr. Gulliver’s 
waistband; and as for the potato plants, they would 
have made a great craggy forest over his head ; and the 
Colorado beetles (which probably did not live in that 
time) would have been huge creatures, upon whose back 
a man might ride. 

Think, too, of what the trees must have been in such 
a region : the great California Red-woods would have 
been mere walking-sticks ; and the mountains would 
have risen up at least some sixty or seventy miles in the 
air, and of course would have been seen a very long dis- 
tance away. Just what that distance might be, looking 
over the sea, it will be easy for you to calculate. 

It seems very strange that a land with such huge 
mountains upon it should never have been discovered 
until Mr. Lemuel Gulliver passed that way ; and yet 
this is hardly more strange than the other things he 
tells. 

One would have thought that such monstrous people 
with their monstrous tools of all kinds — a sickle was 
larger than our scythes — should have had great tele- 
scopes too, so that wonderful sights would be opened to 
them in the skies ; but if it were so, he tells us nothing 
of it On another of his voyages, however, to a land 


GULLIVER SWIFT. 


105 


called Laputa, — which was a land that floated about in 
the air and was directed by a huge magnet, — he does 
tell us of strange things discovered in the sky. Among 
the rest, he assures us that these Laputans had found 
out that the planet Mars had two moons or satellites 
revolving about it, — whereof one revolves in the space 
of ten hours, and the other in twenty-one and a half. 

You may be sure that the British astronomers had no 
faith in this when Gulliver reported it ; certainly no 
one except these Laputans had ever seen such moons : 
and now, in this year 1877, it proves that the report is 
quite true, and that there are such moons, — though 
their times of revolution may be a little different, — and 
they have been discovered through the great telescope 
in Washington. 

What if the other reports which Gulliver made 
should some day prove to be true ! What if we should 
find somewhere in the interior of Africa queer little 
people like Liliputians, or great monsters of men like 
those of Brobdingnag ! 

Though these last were monstrous in size, they were 
excellent, quiet people. Gulliver had a great many long 
talks with their King, who had a strong liking for this 
little traveller, and led him on to tell all about the gov- 
ernment and usages of the country from which he had 
sailed. He thought Mr. Gulliver did a wise thing in 
sailing away from it. For when he heard of the bicker- 
ing, and wars, and bribery, and cheating, and prisons, 
which were common in England, he thought the people 
must be “ contemptible little vermin,” and said so plainly 
to Mr. Gulliver. 

Mr. Gulliver does not seem to have been offended, or 


lo6 ABOUT OLD STORY-TELLERS. 

at least he did not resent this plain talking ; and when 
he told the King further, that in his country men were 
used to making great tubes of metal (as large as his 
majesty’s tooth-pick), and filled them with a black powder 
and hot shot, and then fired them off with a terrible 
explosion, so as to kill and maim as many men as possi- 
ble at one blast — the big King was horrified. And, 
when one thinks of it closely, it does seem horrible. 

Gulliver told the King, one day, in the course of a con- 
versation, which he held by sitting upon a chair placed 
on a cabinet, and the cabinet on a table, — all which 
brought Mr. Gulliver about on a level with the King’s 
ear, who kindly took a low seat, — I say Gulliver told 
the King that in his country — meaning England — 
there were a thousand works published on the art of 
government. The big King said only, “Pooh ! pooh!” 
but afterward gave it as his opinion that “whoever 
could make two ears of corn or two blades of grass to 
grow upon a spot of ground where only one grew before, 
would deserve better of mankind, and do more service to 
his country, than the whole race of politicians put 
together.” 

A good many orators have said the same thing since ; 
but the King of Brobdingnag said it first. 

Of course Mr. Gulliver must have found it very awk 
ward in getting about in houses where the steps were all 
five feet high, and where the level of the seats was six- 
teen feet above the floor. The flies, too, were as large 
as robins, and came buzzing frightfully about his ears. 
He had a very narrow escape, also, from a couple of 
rats ; when his great presence of mind alone saved him 
from death. 


GULLIVER SWIFT. 


107 


It happened in this wise. He had been left asleep on 
a bedstead twenty feet from the floor, in a chamber 
which was about three hundred feet wide by five hundred 
feet long, and high in proportion. Waking up suddenly, 
he saw two enormous beasts, as large as large mastiEs, 
but with the whiskers and tails of rats, tramping toward 
him. One seized him by the collar, and had nearly 
throttled him, when he managed to draw out the short 
sword which he always wore, and with it he pierced the 



Gulliver Kills a Rat. 


monster rat through the body. The other ran away 
frightened, but not until the traveller had given him two 
or three good thwacks with his weapon. 

He was, however, very limp and exhausted after this 
battle — as you observe in this picture of him. 

Fortunately, Mr. Gulliver kept a journal, or else wrote 


io8 


ABOUT OLD STORY-TELLERS. 


out the account of his travels and of his adventures 
when they were fresh in his mind. But his friend Mr. 
Sympson, of whom I spoke in the beginning, did not 
cause his travels to be printed until a good many years 
after. Why, I’m sure I don’t know. When were 
printed, people in England were very much astonished ; 
and some curious ones went so far as to go down into 
Nottinghamshire to have an interview with Mr. Gulliver. 
But, bless you, he wasn’t there. He was not anywhere, 
the Nottingham people said. And some went so far as 
to say there was no Mr. Sympson. 

Who then } 


Who was Gulliver ? 

« 

There can’t be travels unless there’s a traveller, — 
that’s certain. If Mr. Gulliver didn’t bring away those 
small cattle in his pocket from Blefuscu, — which Capt. 
Biddel saw, and Capt. Biddel’s mate saw, — where did 
he bring them from 1 or if Mr. Gulliver didn’t fetch them 
himself, who did } 

Everybody asked, and for a good while nobody knew. 
At last it all came out. There was no Gulliver, and 
there was no Sympson, — only Dean Swift, a queer sort 
of Irish clergyman, who saw in his own library every 
thing that Gulliver professed to have seen. And this 
Dean Swift was as strange a creature as any that Mr. 
Gulliver saw. 

He was a child of English parents, though he was 
born in Ireland, and lived most of his life in Ireland. 

Sir William Temple had married a relative of Swift’s 
mother, and therefore he was befriended by Sir William 


GULLIVER SWIFT. 


109 


Temple, and through him came to know a great many 
distinguished people of England, — the King among the 
rest. He had a university education, and a powerful 
and acute mind, and enormous ambition. These things 
would have made him a distinguished man, even if he 
had never known Sir William Temple and never known 
the King. 

But he was an utterly selfish man ; and though he was 
admired by thousands, he was loved by very few. 

That queer story of Gulliver, I have told you of, was 
written by him, — not so much to amuse his readers as 
to ridicule the people he had met about the court of 
England. He loved dearly to ridicule people whom he 
disliked ; and I think he disliked nearly the whole human 
race. 

He wanted to be a Bishop ; but Archbishop Sharp 
told the Queen that he was unfit to be a Bishop ; and I 
think Sharp was right. A man who is doing his best 
only when he is saying (or writing) harsh, witty things of 
other people, is not the man for Bishop, or clergyman 
either. 

And yet — so strange a creature was this Dean Swift 
— he did, at one time, make himself respected and held 
in good esteem as a parish priest. Not such a man, we 
may be sure, as the excellent Dr. Primrose ; but he filled 
up the measure of his duties with a sturdy zeal, and for 
the poor or those who were beneath him in position, he 
never had bitter words. He gave in charity too, but 
often with such look of scorn as made it hard to accept 
his gifts. At the last, too, — to do him justice, — he left 
a large sum to endow a hospital for lunatics ; and if he 
could have had his way, and had possessed money 


ABOUT OLD STORY-TELLERS. 


1 10 

enough, I think he would have clapped half the world 
into such an asylum. A very great man, to be sure — 
as his writings and his influence show; but a soured 
man ; with good instincts sometimes struggling up to 
light ; and sometimes amazing people by sudden explo- 
sions of generosity ; but yet — all through his life, mak- 
ing ten men hate and fear him, where he made one love 
him. 

It must be said that his boyhood was a hard one : he 
had no father to direct or win him; he was poor; he 
only gained his education by the charity of an uncle 
whom he never loved, and of whom, in his savage way, 
he always spoke scornfully ; he quarrelled with his 
teachers. His only sister married badly, and he never 
forgave her for it ; and, though he came afterward to 
give support to her family, he did it grudgingly. He 
quarrelled with Sir William Temple, who was one of the 
gentlest and most amiable of men ; and when he came, 
by his splendid talents, to be associated with the first 
men in England, — there were few of them in political 
life with whom he did not sooner or later find himself at 
war. ' 

He lived when Pope lived, and Gay and Bolingbroke 
and Steele and Defoe, the author of “Robinson Crusoe.” 
But I think he never knew this last, and I dare say 
thought of him as a tile-maker and a quack. Yet there 
can be no doubt that he read “ Robinson Crusoe,” which 
was published only five or six years before Gulliver’s 
travels ; and the minute careful descriptions in this last 
remind one very much of the pains-taking descriptions 
in the voyages of Crusoe. 


GULLIVER SWIFT, 


III 


Dean Swift’s Love. 

Of domestic comforts Swift knew very little, and per- 
haps cared little. In his early life he had met Esther 
Johnson, a charming young person, who was living under 
the guardianship of Sir William Temple. Under his 



Dean Swift. 


direction he became her tutor ; he admired her quick- 
ness ; perhaps he admired her beauty : certain it is that 
he so won upon her that she gave her heart and faith to 
him wholly. She was that “ Stella” whom all the world 
came to know through his poems. 

When he went to take a parish in Ireland, she fob 


II2 


ABOUT OLD STORY-TELLERS, 


lowed with an elderly lady friend, and took a cottage 
near to his parsonage. There she lived for years — 
people wondering at this strange friendship ; she, poor 
girl, believing her idol, the great Dean, could do nothing 
wrong. In later life he did indeed marry her privately, 
but she never came to make glad any home of his ; nor 
would he — though she entreated it again and again — 
ever publicly acknowledge the marriage. Beside her 
death-bed he did relent; but poor Esther Johnson said 
it was too late ; and she died with a blighted name, and 
heart-broken. 

This was bad enough : but more remains to be told. 
At the very time when “Stella” was receiving fond 
letters from this strange Dean — when he never went to 
England without declaring to her how hard it was to be 
away — when he was writing fierce political pamphlets, 
and pushing intrigues at Court ; he was writing letters 

— quite as fond as those to “ Stella ” — to a wealthy and 
beautiful Miss Van-homrig, who is known as the “ Va- 
nessa” of some of his best verses. She was highly 
educated ; she admired the Dean ; they read together : 
their intimacy was such that all who knew of it believed 
that he wished and intended to make her his wife. She 
was led to believe this too : she never doubted Dr. Swift 

— not even when rumors came to her ear of the true 
story of “Stella.” But, finding out with her woman’s 
wit the real name of “ Stella,” she wrote to her a letter, 
asking what claim she had to the protection and love of 
Dean Swift. 

It was after the private marriage; and “Stella” told 
all, and sent “Vanessa’s” letter to the Dean. Fast as 
horses would carry him the Dean rode away to that 


GULLIVER SWIFT. 


II3 

beautiful home of Miss Van-homrig, where he had met 
such kindly greetings — where over and over they two 
had read poetry together under the shade of the laurel 
boughs, — laurels of “Vanessa’s” own planting, and all 
planted in honor of the Dean — he did not now slacken 
pace until he was at the door ; he passed into the room 
where the poor, shrinking, frightened Vanessa waited 
her fate. He threw her letter wide open upon the table, 
and with an oath of defiance turned upon his heel, and 
strode out of the house, — never to enter it again. 

She, poor woman, whose heart had gone out to his, 
bowed underneath this blast of his fury. Three weeks 
after this, they buried her — the victim of Dean Swift’s 
rage and double dealing. 

Do you think this was the sort of a man to make a 
clergyman of ? And yet he could so impose on men of 
eminence, that the great Addison wrote on the fly-leaf 
of a little book which he gave him, — “To Dr. Jonathan 
Swift ; the most agreeable companion, the truest friend, 
and the greatest genius of his age.” 

Certainly he was a rare genius. No other English 
writer has ever put words together in a way which shows 
more surely and more sharply his real meaning; and 
none ever put more meaning into his words. If he 
were only less coarse and less indecent, — for he is often 
both, — no better model for strong, clear writing could 
be given you. As it is, I would advise only the reading 
of the Liliput voyage of Gulliver. 

And what old age do you think befell this great man ? 
No calm, — no peace in it ; no quietude of home ; no chil- 
dren ever fondled him. He grew so petulant and irrita- 
ble, that no one wanted to live in the same house with 


ABOUT OLD STORY-TELLERS. 


1 14 

him. Then came moodiness and melancholy. For a 
year he said never a word to any one. At last that 
great mind of his — which was joined to no heart at all 

— broke down, and went out. Yet still he lingered ; he 
ate ; he slept ; he paced his chamber — knowing nothing 

— saying nothing that was worth saying ; and only hired 
keepers were with him at his death. 

If he were alive to-day, and at his best, we might like 
to have him make our dictionaries for us, or go to 
Washington for us; but of a certainty — knowing him 
as we do — we should never want him to preach Chris- 
tianity for us, or to sit down with us at our firesides. 



A Brobdingnag Book. 



VI. 

AN IRISH STORY-TELLER. 

Who was She? 

D id you ever hear of Gretna-Green, and of Gretna- 
Green marriages ? 

Gretna is a small place in Scotland, only a little way 
over the English border, as you go from Carlisle to 
Dumfries ; and it used to be famous as a place for run- 
away couples to go and be married — a thing that it was 
much easier to do, without consent of relatives, under 
the Scotch law, than under the English law. 

Well, in the year 1763 — the year when poor Gold- 
smith was getting into trouble with his landlady, and 
had the “Vicar of Wakefield” still in his drawer — 
there drove up to the inn at Gretna a fine carriage with 
a young gentleman in it, hardly nineteen years old, who 
was an Oxford student ; and he brought with him a 
young girl only seventeen ; and these runaways were 
married there by the blacksmith of the village, who 
was also justice of the peace. 

I suppose the parents were indignant ; but I think 



Il6 ABOUT OLD STORY-TELLERS. 

they forgave them afterward. The young wife lived 
only a few years ; but she left to her husband two 
children. The oldest, a boy, was brought up in a very 
strange way, — yet a way which had been commended 
by a French philosopher, — Rousseau (who never had a 
child that he cared for). This young Oxford man was 
at this time a great admirer of Rousseau : so his boy 
did what he chose to do, and nothing that he did not 
choose. He was never punished ; wore no clothing 
beyond what decency required ; and grew up, as any- 
body might expect, a strong, active, ungovernable, bare- 
armed and bare-legged young savage. He took a strong 
liking for the sea, just when his father would have been 
glad to keep him on land ; and to sea he went ; and at 
sea he kept — until in after days he went to America, 
married there, and settled near to Georgetown in South 
Carolina, where, it is said, some of his descendants still 
live. 

The second child of this runaway match was a 
daughter, who grew up to be one of the best-known 
women in all Europe ; and her name — if you have not 
guessed it already — was Maria Edgeworth. 

Her father — Richard Lovell Edgeworth, married 
again ; in fact, he married a third and a fourth wife 
before he was sixty ; and he had a great company of 
children, who lived with him in a huge country house 
near to Longford in the centre of Ireland. Here Maria 
Edgeworth went, when she was only four years old ; here 
she grew into such love for Ireland and the Irish, that 
she called herself an Irishwoman, and was proud to be 
so called ; and here she wrote those stories which were 
the delight of all young people forty years ago, and 


A AT IRISH STORY-TELLER. 11 / 

those novels which were the delight of all the grown 
people of her time. — You never heard of them I Well, 
well ! Yet it is not so very long ago that she was alive 
there, — a good, kindly old lady ; and her stepmother 
— the latest wife of Richard Edgeworth — died only the 
other day (1864). 

It is quite too soon to forget good Miss Edgeworth 
and her books. Why, in my school-days, the fellow who 
had not read “Eton Montem,” and “Forrester,” and 
“Waste not. Want not,” was not counted much of a 
reader. There were long words in them, and some 
prosiness, maybe (Dr. Johnson, who set the example 
of long words, was the great man in her young days, you 
must remember) ; but there was a good plot in her 
stories, and a good winding-up. You couldn’t tell now, 
if you were to read one of her books, what church she 
attended, or what party she voted with ; but you could 
find, scattered up and down, such talk as would show — 
that honesty and common sense and good manners and 
good morals and all charities were always venerated by 
her, and always taught by her. 

Eer Stories. 

I don’t think I shall forget to the last day of my life, 
the long white Chalk-Hill near to Dunstable, where 
Paul and his little sister “scotched” the wheels of the 
chaises that went toiling up, so that the horses might 
take a breathing-spell. The story was in the “ Parents’ 
Assistant ; ” and there was a quaint old cut showing 
Paul with his “ scotcher,” and sister Anne, and the old 
grandmother — talking- over the guinea which had been 
given the children by accident. 


Il8 ABOUT OLD STORY-TELLERS. • 

Would he keep it? — would he return it ? Of course 
we knew how it would be ; and the sturdy honesty and 



Basket- Woman. 


pluck of the lad as he went bustling through the inn- 
yard at Dunstable was more refreshing than the eighth 
commandment repeated ten times over. 

Some of us made “scotchers,” to look like Paul’s, out 
of blocks and broom-handles ; but there were no chaise- 
wheels and no long chalk-hills to help us out ; and no 


AN IRISH STORY-TELLLER. 1 19 

guineas dropped into otir hats by accident or otherwise. 
If there had been, I think we should have caught — all 
the same — the infection of good Miss Edgeworth’s 
straightforward honesty. Healthy, cheery, unhesitat 
ing honesty is always catching. 

The fact is, that homely old truths, which nobody in 
his senses ever thought of disputing, lie at the bottom 
of most of Miss Edgeworth’s pleasant stories, and put 
their color on them from beginning to end. 

She doesn’t take the sly way of covering up a moral 
pill in a spoonful of jelly — so that a boy shall bolt it 
without knowing it ; nor does she tie the lesson she 
wants to teach upon the end of her stories — like a 
snapper ; but it runs all through them, and is so strong 
and sound and good that every boy’s common sense 
makes him stand up stoutly for her little heroes. 

Take that old tale of “Waste not. Want not.” Mr. 
Meacham is a shrewd, practical, kindly-disposed man, 
who — having no sons of his own — has taken a couple 
of nephews to bring up and care for. 

Hal is free and easy ; and has been brought up to 
have a great respect for people with a great trail — 
whether of titles or of silk. How the boy does wor- 
ship Lady Diana Sweepstakes and her sons ! 

Ben, the other nephew, is thoughtful, quiet, careful, 
plodding, and doesn’t think of running after boys be- 
cause they are Lady Diana’s sons. 

Mr. Meacham — wanting to test the working ways of 
his two nephews — gives to each a big parcel to undo. 
Hal goes daintily about his task, — puzzles over the 
knots, — gets petulant, — whips out his knife, and cuts 
all clean. Ben sets himself sturdily to a careful unty* 


20 


ABOUT OLD STORY-TELLERS. 


ing of the fastenings, and saves a good bit of whipcord 
Next day Mr. Meacham gives each of them a top — but 
without strings. Ben, by his steady care of yesterday, 
is provided with a capital one. Hal — in a gust of per- 
plexity — at last pulls off his hat-band, and uses it up. 

Presently afterward, a great archery match is to come 
off under the patronage of Lady Diana. Both are pro- 
vided with bows and arrows, — thanks to uncle Meach- 
am : and both, by a little practice, come to be good 
shots. Hal wants a white and green uniform to wear — 
since Lady Diana’s boys are to have such. Ben does 
not care so much to do things because Lady Di’s 
boys do them ; and puts his money into a good winter 
coat, that will be of service when the archery day is 
gone by. 

Well, the time for the match comes at length. Hal is 
very fine in his green and white ; but it is something 
cold and windy ; and his hat — for want of that band 
which went to top-spinning some days before — goes 
spinning over a ploughed field, where Hal must needs 
follow, and comes back with his green and white uni- 
form woefully draggled and besmeared with red mud. 
He could bear this better if he did not catch a sneering 
look from Lady Diana and Lady Diana’s boys : those 
who worship fashion must take fashion’s sneers. How- 
ever, he stands up bravely to the shooting. The Sweep- 
stakes boys have made good ventures ; Hal does fairly 
at the first two shots (they have three each) ; but at 
the third — twang ! goes his bow-string, — hopelessly 
broken. 

Ben shoots as well; is mighty comfortable, too, in his 
snug linsey-woolsey coat; but it could not bar him 


AN IRISH STORY-TELLER. 


I2I 


against accident. His bow-string gives out at the sec- 
ond shot. Ben is not flustered one jot : he pulls out 
that bit of whipcord which he had saved from his par- 
cel-fastening, and which had done service with his top, 
— adjusts it to his bow, — takes new aim, and with two 
capital shots — one after the other — wins the match. 

I suspect that little experience — as recorded in the 

Parents’ Assistant ” — has led to the saving of a great 
deal of whipcord first and last : and I suspect it has 
lessened the eagerness with which some boys — even 
American boys — will go hunting after familiarity with 
the showy Lady Dianas and the Lady Diana’s sons. 
Miss Edgeworth did not believe in fustian. 

Then there was that jolly story — as we easily thought 
it — of the ‘‘Limerick Gloves.” What a pig-headed 
British obstincxy in the old verger Jonathan Hill, with 
his — “What I say, I say; and what I think, I think.” 
We had seen such people, though they did not wear 
wigs like the verger of Hereford. There was the stout 
wife too, who set him upon the hunt for unreal troubles, 
and carried her head so high ; and the pretty Phoebe, 
with the bang in her hair, looking demure, but very 
constant in thinking well of Mr. Brian O’Neill, whatever 
papa might do or say. 

It looked as if there were a great Popish plot to come 
out in the story, and as if the Hereford Cathedral were 
to be blown up ; but it ends in a scare about a mere rat- 
hole under the church wall, and in the pretty Phoebe 
wearing her Limerick gloves ; and “ no perfume ever 
was so delightful to her lover ” (who was Brian O’Neill) 
“ as the smell of the rose-leaves in which they had been 
kept.” The moral of the tale is, — we have no right 


122 


ABOUT OLD STORY-TELLERS. 


to suspect people of roguery and arson because they do 
not sing out of our hymn-book. 

I have no doubt Phoebe and O’Neill married ; but 
Miss Edgeworth doesn’t say so. In fact, few of her 
stories are love-stories in the ordinary sense. She 
never married herself ; and I dare say saw no reason 
why a story — like a life — might not be a good one 
without being rounded off with a marriage. 



Limerick Gloves. 


Nearly all of her stories were written in that old 
country-house in Ireland. There was almost always a 
troop of children in it, as I have said, whom she loved, 
and who loved her. The father, too, was a companion 
and a helper in all her work ; for he had bravely given 
over all the wild courses of his younger days, and was 
one of the best of landlords ; seeking always for means 
to help on his work-people, and so knitting their inter- 
ests with his own, that in the rebellion of 1798, when 
so many brave young -Irishmen went to the scaffold, and 


AN IRISH STORY-TELLER. 


23 


SO many homes were desolated, the Edgeworth house 
(though they were obliged to leave it for a time, in the 
madness of the outbreak) was wholly unharmed. Even 
the pens and papers upon Miss Edgeworth’s table were 
found, at their return, precisely as she had left them. 



Edgeworth. 


An avenue of gaunt old trees leads up to the mansion 
from the high road ; and the library windows look out 
upon lawn and garden, which were always in the old 
time carefully kept. And it is a wonderful thing, and 
worth the telling — that this good lady authoress never 
had her “moods” — never neglected commonest every^ 
day duties, and actually did her book-making work sur^ 
rounded by the family, — with only such retirement as 
she could gain by placing her quaint little writing-table 
(still preserved) in a corner of the great library, which 
was also the common sitting-room. 


124 


ABOUT OLD STORY-TELLERS. 


But it was an orderly and a cheery household. Mr. 
Edgeworth writes to Dr. Darwin in 1796 — '‘I do not 
think one tear a month is shed in this house, nor the 
voice of reproof heard.” The son who had been bred 
half a savage was gone at this time ; else I think he 
would have amused himself with pinching the fat arms 
of the little ones. 

I cannot show you a portrait of Miss Edgeworth ; for 
she would never consent to sit for one. She was not 
beautiful, but very comely, and had those virtues which 
almost compensate for beauty — extremest cleanliness 
and neatness of dress and person. 

Forester. 

Upon the whole, I think the best short story of Miss 
Edgeworth’s is that which she calls “Forester;” it is 
certainly worth every boy’s reading. I can only give 
you a sketch of it. 

The hero was the son of a strange English gentle- 
man, who had very curious notions about society and 
education, — not very unlike those which Mr. Edge- 
worth held when he was making a half-savage of his 
oldest son. 

Forester’s father died when the lad was nineteen ; 
and he was placed under the guardianship of Dr. Camp- 
bell, a clever and learned man, who had a clever son 
Henry, and a pretty lass of a daughter called Flora. 

Forester was brave and generous and truthful ; but 
he had been taught to believe that cleanliness and good 
manners and the usual forms of cultivated society were 
idle things, not worthy of the consideration of a reflect- 


AN IRISH STORY-TELLER. 


125 


ing man ; and he brought his half-savage habits into the 
family of the good Dr. Campbell. The Campbells, see- 
ing his better qualities, bore with him patiently ; but 
there was a certain Lady Mackenzie, with her son 
Archibald, living under the same roof — very preten- 
tious and artificial and shallow, both of them. These 
lose no occasion to ridicule the shortcomings of poor 
Forester, who finds that the ridicule of the shallow, if 
well informed in the ways of the world, is very irritat- 
ing. He pays back ridicule with a noisy contempt ; and 
his sense of truth is not kept in check by any regard for 
the feelings of others. He would have lived as inde- 
pendent as Robinson Crusoe, if he could, and with as 
little practice of the ordinary courtesies of society. He 
had been taught to think that a polished manner must 
needs go always with a selfish indolence ; and he showed 
his hate for it by wanton disregard of proprieties, and 
by choosing his companions among those beneath him, 
whom he honored only because they were without any 
fashionable gloss. 

I suppose that most of big-brained boys go through 
this state of feeling at some period of their youth ; but 
they never get on very well in life until they master it 
and hold it decently in check. 

Forester’s wrong-headedness puts him in the way of 
incurring a good many damaging suspicions — that are 
slyly fed by the Mackenzies, who hate the lad’s coarse- 
ness, and are jealous of his cleverness. But this he 
could bear bravely enough, — with the knowledge that 
he was honest and true. But when his slovenliness and 
disregard for appearances exposed him to the open ridi- 
cule of a company of well-bred people — as it did upon 


126 


ABOUT OLD STORY-TELLERS. 



a memorable evening at his friends, the Campbells, he 
forswears all further intercourse with such people — 
packs up his wardrobe, — writes an adieu to the Camp* 
bells, and goes to live with an industrious, simple- 
minded gardener. 

He finds, however, that the gardener and the garden- 
er’s people — however simple-minded they may be — 
are just as self-seeking as those he has left ; and that it 

is none the better for 
being coarsely shown. 
He learns how to plant 
flowers, and enjoys it ; 
but he doesn’t find any 
delightful Arcadia with 
the gardener. 

He conceals his name 
so that old acquaint- 
ances shall know noth- 
ing of him ; yet his new 
acquaintances are not 
satisfying : so he chan- 
ges quarters, and estab- 
lishes himself in the 
office of a great brew= 
ery. Oddly enough, he 
“ Forester.” doesn’t find the clerks 

and apprentices here 
altogether perfect. He gets his dismission at an early 
day, because he will not join his fellow clerks in sup- 
porting some false report to the officers of excise. 

He next undertakes employment with a bookseller 
and printer, whom he has encountered accidentally, and 


AN IRISH STORY-TELLER. 


127 


with whom he doubtless hopes to find purity without 
any pretence or parade. I doubt if he did ; so does Miss 
Edgeworth. 

Meantime he had been practising extravagant chari- 
ties — siding with poor street people in quarrels he 
knew nothing of — thrusting himself into situations by 
his independent bravado, that made him easily suspected 
of bad deeds. Indeed, it came to that pass at last, that 
he was fairly arrested as party to a theft of which he 
knew no more than the man in the moon. 

As an independent young citizen who wanted to live 
his own life without thanks to anybody — there was no 
one to help him. But as young Forester — when his 
name came to be known — and former companion to 
young Henry Campbell, the old Doctor and all his 
friends came forward to aid him in spite of himself. 
These establish very clearly the honesty of the young 
man ; but in making this clear, it was equally well 
proven that he had acted with very great folly. Perhaps 
it was some consolation to him to know that the real 
culprit — so far as there was any culprit at all in the 
matter of the theft — was his old enemy, the elegant 
Archibald Mackenzie. 

Forester is brought to think better of the Campbells 
— gentlemanly as they are ; and he is taught, too, to pay 
more regard than had been his habit to those formali- 
ties of society, which the usage and good-fellowship of 
the world — for a few centuries past — have laid down 
for law. He gave over the hope of fighting windmills 
and carrying off honor ; or of overleaping the customs 
of civilized life at a bound. In the excess of his new- 
found tolerance, it is stated that he condescends to 


128 


ABOUT OLD STORY-TELLERS. 


take a few dancing-lessons. He goes back to his old 
intimacy with the Campbells — father and son and 
daughter. He wears clean linen — does not put on 
Crusoe goat-skins ; thinks no worse of people for say- 
ing “ Good-morning ” cheerily and to all the world ; does 
not consider a shabby coat or a coarse speech of neces- 
sity a reason for showing favor ; and the curtain of the 
little story drops upon our hero — dancing a Scotch reel 
with the pretty Flora Campbell ! 

Whether they made a match of it, Miss Edgeworth 
does not say, and has no need to say. The tale is 
pointed with a moral, though it be not blazoned with a 
marriage. 


VII. 


TWO FRENCH FRIENDS. 

'Burst of Bevolution. 

I REMEMBER that in my old Geography — a lit- 
tle square, fat book, most unlike the Geographies 
which I observe spread out under the eyes and elbows 
of youngsters nowadays — the Frenchman was pic- 
tured and described as an extremely limber and graceful 
gentleman, taking off his hat with a wide flourish to 
ladies in great furbelows, or else dancing with others 
of like elegance around a tall tree ; and I always found 
it very hard to believe how so gay and polite and fes- 
tive gentlemen should have taken it into their hearts 
or heads to engage in the bloody work of those Days of 
Terror,” which were also spoken of in the Geography. 
I have discovered since, that dancing men and women 
are often very cruel, and do not care on whose toes 
they tread. 

You have all heard, I dare say, of the French Revo- 
lution. But do you know how it came about, and what 
its terrors were ? 


129 


130 


ABOUT OLD STORY-TELLERS. 


It came about because there had been a great many 
wicked kings and wicked nobles in France, who had 
lived only for their own selfish ends, and had considered 
the people as beasts of burden, to be used to help them 
forward in their pleasure-seeking and their money-getting. 
If they wanted war for any ambitious purpose of their 
own, whole regions were desolated, and sons and fathers 
and husbands swept away down the bloody path that 
war always makes. If they wanted service of any kind, 
— whether honest labor or vile labor, — children were 
torn from parents, and new-married wives from - their 
husbands. 

But the poorest of the French people were so igno- 
rant, and had lived in a state of slavish dread of those 
who were above them in rank, for so long a time, that 
perhaps they would have borne their trials longer — 
if it had not happened that very many among the richer 
people, and the better educated ones suffered too, by 
reason of quarrels with the nobles, or quarrels among 
themselves, or abuses of the king or his courtiers. 
Among the most fearful of these abuses were those 
which were committed under the authority of what were 
called lettres du cachety or letters with the royal seal. 
Throughout the reigns of Louis XIV. and of Louis XV., 
this sort of tyranny was common. Thus, if a noble 
bore a grudge against some neighbor, and wished to take 
him out of the way, he would apply to the king or to a 
royal minister, and beg or buy an order with the royal 
seal upon it: — Under authority of this royal order, he 
would send a file of soldiers to seize his enemy, and 
thrust him into a prison of the state, where he might 
spend years without communication with wife or friends. 


TPFO FRENCH FRIENDS, 


131 

Friends or family would not know, indeed, whither he 
had gone ; and so secretly would the work be done, that 
they could not tell when or by whom he was torn away. 
Sometimes an old, white-haired man, who had been 
almost forgotten, would suddenly appear among his 
acquaintances again, after twenty years of dungeon 
life. 

If you should ever read Mr. Dickens’s ‘‘Tale of Two 
Cities,” — and it is one of the strongest stories he wrote, 
and well worth your reading, — you will find a thrilling 
narrative of the imprisonment of a French physician, 
— who was torn away from his young wife, and for 
sixteen long years never heard if she were alive or 
dead. No wonder that his mind gave way, and that 
when he found liberty at last, he was a poor decrepit 
shadow of a man. 

There is also another terrible story of abuse under 
these lettres du cachety which is said to be wholly true, 
and which appeared in a book called “Letters from 
France,” by Helen Maria Williams, — an English lady 
who passed much time in France before the Revolution, 
and who was herself a prisoner in the Temple, under the 
rule of Robespierre. Her story was about a black- 
hearted father, who, — under cover of one of these kingly 
orders or letters, — caused his own son, who had offended 
him, to be snatched away from his family, and to be 
buried in a dungeon for years. In fact, there was 
hardly any crime against persons that might not be 
permitted under shelter of one of those terrible “letters” 
of the king. 

What would you think, pray, if our President, or 
Gen. Sherman, might issue a letter with the State seal 


132 


ABOUT OLD STORY-TELLERS. 


affixed, which would empower any marshal or politician — 
or whoever might gain possession of the letter — to seize 
upon any enemy of his at dead of night, and bear him 
off to prison, and keep him there so long as he might 
choose ? Would not such a power, unchecked by any 
courts of justice or by law, make of our country — or of 
any country — a very doleful place to live in ? 

And can you wonder that those poor people in that 
far-away France, and in that far-away time (nearly a 
hundred years now), should have chafed under it, and 
talked bitterly and threateningly ; until after a while 
their angry and threatening talk grew into a great tem- 
pest that swept through the Paris streets like a whirl- 
wind ? 

No wonder they were maddened ; no wonder their 
passion got the better of their judgment ; no wonder 
the population, led on by enraged men, worked deeds 
of cruelty which made all Europe shudder. Very great 
wrongs, however orderly, are almost always balanced — 
sooner or later — by very great and disorderly avenge 
ment. 

When that tempest of madness I was speaking of just 
now first swept through the streets of Paris, in the reign 
of Louis XVL, it drove the crazed people in herds, to 
glut their vengeance upon those who were keeping cap- 
tives in chains, within the great prison of the Bastille. 
This was a grim and dismal-looking building upon the 
borders of Paris, with sluggish water around it ; and 
its door was entered by a draw-bridge. Toward the 
frowning walls of this prison (there is only a tall bronze 
column upon the spot now) the populace of the city 
rushed headlong, with whatever weapons they could, la}f 


TIVO FRENCH FRIENDS. 


133 


hands upon. Butchers took their cleavers, stable-men 
their forks, carters their heavy oaken stakes, carpenters 
their axes ; and there were thousands with guns and 
cutlasses, while brawny women carried huge pistols. 



The Bastille. 


The soldiers who guarded the prison were so fright- 
ened by the sights and sounds of this tempest of the 
people’s fury, that they could hardly make any opposing 
fight at all. The governor of the prison, seeing what 
mad rage he must encounter, would have blown up the 
huge building altogether; and had actually laid the 
match to do so, but the soldiers rebelled, and forced him 
to surrender. Then the raging mob flowed in ; and 
those who wore the uniform of the king were smitten 



134 


ABOUT OLD STORY-TELLERS. 


to death. The dungeon gates were unlocked, and prison* 
ers staggered out, who had not seen the sun for dozens 
and scores of years. 


^ays of terror. 

A beautiful girl was caught sight of, flying down one 
of the great stairways. She was straightway seized 
upon by those who believed her to be a daughter of the 
governor, and would have been burned in the court-yard 
had not a few generous soldiers stolen her away, and 
secreted her until the sack was over. As for the gov- 
ernor, — who was a marquis and the king’s friend, — 
they cut off his head, and bore it bleeding from the top 
of a pike-staff, all down the street ; and all down the 
street poured the mad, rejoicing rabble, slaying many 
another as they went, and carrying the trophies with 
them, — gory heads on pikes, or gory heads on chafing- 
dishes carried by women. 

As it was on that day, so it was on many a day there- 
after, and for many a week and month ; and for years, 
whoever was a noble, or friend of the hated nobles, — 
or rich, or friend of the hated rich, — lived, if he lived 
at all in that city of revolution, in great dread and 
danger. 

There was not much feeling at the first against Louis 
XVL, for he was a far better king than those who had 
gone before him. He was kindly at heart, and what we 
might call nowadays a gentlemanly, amiable man, — 
with not much force of character, and disposed to yield 
to the opinions of those who had been his old advisers. 
These, by their obstinacy, brought him very soon to 


TJVO FRENCH FRIENDS. 


135 


grief. The people forced him to trial, and there was a 
forced condemnation. His head, too, fell before the 
fury of the enraged people, and was held up by the exe- 
cutioner upon the scaffold, for the thronging mob to 
look upon. 

This poor king had left behind him in the prison a 
son, whom he had taught, as he best could in those 
dreary prison hours, arithmetic and geography. Do you 
think the boy ever forgot those lessons, or ever forgot 
the sorrow, and the loud wailings of his mother — the 
queen, when the king went out to his death } 

A little after this, those crazy ones who were govern- 
ing France gave over this prince boy to the care of a 
shoemaker and his wife, — to whom they furnished a 
lodgement in the prison ; and they did this in order, as 
they said, that the bringing-up of the boy might be as 
low as that of the lowest of the people. Poor boy ! 
poor prince ! 

A little later, Marie Antoinette, the queen, was taken 
out of her dungeon to go to trial : they called it a trial, 
for the sake of decency ; but I think they knew how it 
would end, before they called on her to appear. If the 
judges before whom she stood had said she was inno- 
cent and must go free, I am sure that the wives of the 
wine-sellers, and the fish-women, and the hags of Paris, 
would have snatched her away, and carried her off to 
execution, — if they had not slain her with their own 
bread-knives in the street. 

These mad people had such a thirst for blood ! 

It was better perhaps that the judges should say the 
queen must be beheaded, as they did, than that these 
wild women should cut her in pieces. 


136 ABOUT OLD STORY-TELLERS. 

She certainly died an easier death by the guillotine. 

Another famous woman who fell under the hands of 
the executioner in these bloody days, and whom we do 
not know whether most to pity or to admire, was Chan 
lotte Corday. 

She was of humble family, in Normandy. No one in 
Paris had ever heard of her when she left her home in 

early July, 1793, to come up 
to the bloody city. Yet 
what she did, and what 
happened to her within one 
week, have made her name 
known everywhere. 

She had a lover who was 
suspected by the revolution- 
ary tribunal, and who was 
assassinated by order of 
Marat, — who was the most 
cruel and the most hated of 
all the men who governed. 

Charlotte Corday deter- 
mined to avenge her lover, 
and free France of the monster Marat. So she jour- 
neyed up to Paris, — went to the home of Marat, — found 
some excuse for admission, — engaged him in talk (for 
she was winning in manner, and intelligent), and, seizing 
her chance, plunged a dagger in his bosom. 

There were many in Paris who gave a sigh of relief 
when they heard of this murder ; but there were howl- 
ing thousands who clamored for the blood of poor Char- 
lotte Corday. A young man offered to die in her place ; 
but this could not be. There was a sharp, quick trial, 



Charlotte Corday. 


TWO FRENCH FRIENDS. 


137 


and within a week, — in her little Norman sacque, — 
and in her Norman cap, she too went through the 
streets to take her turn under the sharp, swift knife of 
the guillotine. 


the Guilloiine. 

You don’t know what the guillotine is ? 

I will tell you. Perhaps you have sometimes seen 
the great knives sliding up and down in a frame, by 
which hay and straw are cut for horses. Well, im- 
agine, if you can, a knife like those, — only a great deal 
larger and a great deal sharper, — working up and down 
in grooves like the straw-cutter. Then imagine such a 
knife at the top of two grooved posts some eight feet 
high, with a great weight resting on it ; then fancy the 
poor victim lying at the foot of these posts, with the 
bared neck placed directly between the grooves ; next 
imagine the headsman, — as he was called, — pulling a 
cord which sets the great knife free — to come — clang- 
ing down with an awful thud 

It does dreadfully quick work : but, for all that, it is 
the most humane way of executing capital punishment : 
— if there be any humanity in it at all — which I doubt. 

The machine was called gtdllotine, after a Dr. Guillo- 
tin, who, in the French Assembly in 1791, proposed a 
better way of cutting off people’s heads than the old 
way of doing it by an axe ; which he said was a clumsy 
way, and clumsy headsmen sometimes made bad work 
of it. But Dr. Guillotin was not the inventor, as some 
books will tell you ; nor did he lose his own head by it, 
as other books will tell you. 


138 ABOUT OLD STORY-TELLERS. 

In 1792 the question of finding some new way of 
execution was referred to Dr. Antoine Louis, the Secre- 
tary of the College of Surgeons ; and he advised such a 
method as had been hinted at by Dr. Guillotin the year 
before. They had therefore a machine made for trial 
by one Schmidt, who was a knife-maker. Finding it 
worked well, after trial, they adopted it ; and people 
called it at first “Louisette.” But Dr. Louis said he 
didn’t invent it, or make it. (Webster’s Unabridged 
Dictionary, which is so rarely wrong, makes a mistake 
in saying he did invent it.) 

So the people went back on the name of Dr. Guillo- 
tin — all because a poet of that day had made some 
jingling rhymes, in which the honor had been referred 
to him. 

The real truth is, that a machine like it had been used 
in Italy, at Genoa, two hundred years before ; and in 
England, at Halifax ; and in Scotland, at Edinburgh, 
more than a hundred years before. The Scotch people 
had called it The Maiden.” 

It is a dreadful machine, and does very quick work, 
as I know ; for I have myself seen a man’s head taken 
off by it ; and I never wish to see such a sight again. 

And now, why do you suppose I have run over this 
dismal bit of history } Only as a sort of introduction 
to two of your good friends, — a man and a woman who 
lived in Paris through all this time of blood, and who 
yet have written the two most charming and pleasant 
stories for children that are anywhere to be found in 
the French language. 


TJVO FRENCH FRIENDS. 


139 


Paul and Virginia. 

The name of the first story is “ Paul and Virginia ; ” 
and the name of its author, Bernardin de St. Pierre. 
He was born at Havre, a seaport town at the mouth 
of the Seine, and went to school there until he was 
twelve; but while he was at school he fell in with a 
translation of ''Robinson Crusoe,” and he loved the 
book so much that he came to love adventure more than 
books, and begged for permission to go over seas with 
an uncle, who was bound for Martinique. 

And he went there, and saw first in that island (which 
you will find on your atlas among the West Indies) the 
bananas, and palms, and orange-trees, and all that rich 
tropical growth, which afterward he scattered up and 
down upon the pages of his story of “Paul and Vir- 
ginia.” 

But the boy Bernardin did not stay in Martinique : 
he grew homesick, and went back to France, and 
studied engineering in Paris ; and before he was twenty 
had gone away again to Malta, which is a strongly for- 
tified little island in the Mediterranean, lying southward 
of Italy. He did not stay, however, in Malta ; for he 
fought a duel there, which made it an unsafe place for 
him. 

Not long after this he obtained a position under the 
famous Empress Catherine of Russia, and had strange 
adventures in Poland ; where it is said a beautiful Polish 
princess would have married the young French engi* 
neer, but her friends took good care she should not 
commit what was counted so great an indiscretion. 


140 


ABOUT OLD STORY-TELLERS. 


He then went to his old home at Havre again ; but 
his family was scattered, and the home broken. He 
next gained an appointment as engineer to the Isle of 
France, — which was another tropical island near to 
Madagascar, in the Indian Ocean. After five or six 



Bernardin de St. Pierre. 


years here, among the bananas and the palm-trees, he 
went back to Paris — without business, without money, 
almost without friends. This was his own fault, how- 
ever ; for he was reckless and petulant and proud. 

He began now to think of printing books, though he 


TIVO FRENCH FRIENDS. I4I 

was past thirty-four. His first venture was a story of 
his voyage to the Isle of France ; afterward he passed 
many years working at what he called “ Studies of Na- 
ture.” He could hardly find a publisher for this. At 
last, however, he bargained with M. Didot to print it, 
— and Didot was the most celebrated printer in France. 
Not only did he print the book of the adventurous Ber- 
nardin, but he gave him his daughter for a wife. 

I suppose that this author gave a great deal more of 
study and of care to his book on Nature, than he did to 
the little story of “Paul and Virginia.” Yet it was this 
last — which was published some two years or more 
before the capture of the Bastille — which gave him his 
great fame. 

Where there was one reader for his other books, 
there were twenty readers for “ Paul and Virginia.” 
In those fierce days when the Revolution was ripening, 
and a gigantic system of privileges was breaking up 
and consuming away, — like straw in fire, — this little 
tender, simple story, with its gushes of sentiment, and 
its warm, tropical atmosphere, was being thumbed in 
porters’ lodges, and was read in wine-shops, and hidden 
under children’s pillows, and was sought after by noble 
women, — and women who were not noble, — and by 
priests who slipped it into their pockets with their 
books of prayer. Even the hard, flinty-faced young 
officer of artillery, Napoleon Bonaparte, had read it 
with delight, and, in after-years, greeted the author 
with the imperial demand, — “ When, M. St. Pierre, will 
you give us another ^Paul and Virginia’ ? ” 

It is only a simple tale, tenderly told. A boy and 
girl love each other, purely and deeply ; they have grown 


142 


ABOUT OLD STORY-TELLERS. 


up together ; they are poor and untaught ; but the 
flowers and fruits are rich around them, and the sweet- 
est odors of the tropics are spent upon the story. Vir- 
ginia — loving the boy — sails away from their island 
home to win education in the old world — of France. 



Paul and Virginia. 


The boy grieves ; and studies that he may match in 
himself the accomplishments which Virginia is gain- 
ing in Europe. At last the ship is heralded which 
speeds her back. In a frenzy of delight Paul sees the 
great ship sweep down toward the shore. 


TIVO FRENCH FRIENDS. 


143 


But clouds threaten ; a wild swift storm bursts over 
the beautiful island ; there is gloom and wreck ; and a 
fair, lifeless form is stranded on the sands. 

Poor Virginia ! Poor Paul ! 

Then — two graves, with the name of the story over 
them. And the birds sing, and the tropical flowers 
bloom as before. 

This is all there is of it. 

Do you not wonder that so slender a tale could take 
any hold upon a people who were ingulfed in the ter- 
rors of that mad revolution } Why was it ? 

Partly, I think, because the dainty and tender tone of 
the story-teller offered such strange contrast to the 
fierce wrangle of daily talk ; partly also, because in the 
breaking down of all the old society laws and habits of 
living in France, it was a relief to catch this sweet 
glimpse of the progress of an innocent life and inno- 
cent love — albeit of children — under purely natural 
influences. 

It is worth your reading, were it only that you may see 
what tender and exaggerated sentiment was relished by 
this strange people, at a time when they were cutting 
off heads in the public square, by hundreds. 

It is specially worth reading in its French dress, for 
its choice and simple and limpid language. 


7he Siberian Wanderer. 

We come now to talk of the other book of which I 
spoke. It is by Madame Cottin, and is called “Eliza- 
beth ; or. The Exiles of Siberia.” 

Siberia, you know, is a country of great wastes, where 


144 


ABOUT OLD STORY-TELLERS. 


snows lie fearfully deep in winter, and winds howl across 
the bleak, vast levels ; and wolves abound. It is under 
the dominion of Russia ; and to this pitiless country the 
emperor of Russia was wont to send prisoners of state 
in close exile — where their names were unknown, and 
all communication would be cut off ; and where they 
would live as if dead. 

Well, Elizabeth was the daughter of such a prisoner ; 
who, with his wife, lived in a lonely habitation in the 
midst of this dreary region. She grows up in this deso- 
late solitude, knowing only those tender parents, and 
their gnawing grief. She knows nothing of their crime, 
or exile, or judge, or real name. But as she ripens into 
girlhood the parents cannot withhold their confidence ; 
and she comes to know of their old, and cherished, and 
luxurious home on the Polish plains, — which is every 
day in their memory. 

From this time forth the loving daughter has but one 
controlling thought ; and that is, — how she may restore 
these sorrowful parents to their home, and to the world. 

It is a child’s purpose ; and opposed to it is the pur- 
pose of the Autocrat of all the Russias. But then, 
courage and persistence are noble things, and they win 
more triumphs than you could believe. They will win 
them over school lessons, and bad habit.s, and bad tem- 
per, — just as surely as they win them in the battles of 
the world. 

So, upon the desolate plains of Siberia the fair young 
girl plots — and plots. How could this frail creature 
set about the undoing of un imperial edict, and the res- 
toration of father and mother to life and happiness once 
more } Over and over she pondered ip? the solemn 


TIVO FRENCH FRIENDS. 


145 


quietude of those wintry Siberian nights, upon all the 
ways which might avail to gain her purpose. At last 
came the resolve — and a very bold one it was — to 
make the journey on foot, from their place of exile to 
the Russian capital ; never doubting — in the fulness of 
her faith — that if she could once gain a hearing from 
the emperor, she could win his favor, and put an end to 
her father’s exile. 

Ah ! what could she know of the depth of state crimes, 
or of the bitterness of royal hate, or of that weary march 
of over two thousand miles across all the breadth of 
Russia } 

She had not the courage to tell of this resolution to 
her parents ; but kept it ever uppermost in her thoughts 
as months and years rolled on, and she gained strength ; 
while the dear lives she most cherished were wasting 
with grief and toil in the wintry solitudes. 

One friend she made her confidant : this was the son 
of the governor of Tobolsk, who, in his hunting expedi- 
tions, had come unawares upon the retired cabin of her 
father, and thereafter repeated twice or thrice his visit. 
He was charmed by her beauty and tenderness, and 
would have spoken of love ; but she had no place in her 
heart for that. Always uppermost in her thought was 
the weary walk to be accomplished, and the pardon to 
be sought. 

The young hunter could not aid her ; for intercourse 
with the exiled family was forbidden, and he had 
already been summoned away and ordered to regions 
unknown. 

At last, after years of waiting, — Elizabeth being now 
eighteen, — an old priest came that way who was jour- 


146 ABOUT OLD STORY-TELLERS. 

neying to the west. It seemed her golden opportunity. 
She declared now, for the first time, her purpose to 
her parents. They expostulated and reasoned with her. 
The long way was a drear one ; monarchs were remorse- 
less ; they had grown old in exile, and could bear it to 
the end. 

But the tender girl was more unshaken and steadfast 
than they. She bade them a tearful adieu, and with 
the old priest by her side, turned her steps toward the 
Russian capital. Very toilsome it was, and day followed 
day, and week week, with wearisome walking ; and be- 
fore the journey was half done the old priest sickened 
and died — she nursing him and closing his eyes for 
his last sleep — in a cabin by the way. 

But still she had no thought of turning back, but 
wearily and painfully pressed on. Week followed week, 
and still long roads lay before her. It will make your 
hearts ache to read the story of her toil, — of her bleed- 
ing feet, — of her encounters with rude plunderers, — 
her struggles with storm and snow and cliff. There 
were great stretches of silent forest ; there were broad 
rivers to cross ; there were gloomy ravines to pass 
through ; and her strength was failing, and she had been 
robbed of her money, and the winter was coming on ; 
and there was no messenger or mail to tell her of the 
dear ones she had left in the little cabin of the exile. 
But through all, her courage never once failed ; and at 
last it rejoiced her heart — to see in the blazing sun- 
light, on the edge of the Muscovite plains, the great 
shining domes of the palace of Moscow. 

Here she was a stranger in a great city ; and the 
wilderness of the streets was full of more terrors and 


TPVO FRENCH FRIENDS. 


147 


more dangers for her than the wilderness of the vast for- 
ests she had crossed in safety. Her very frailty, how- 
ever, with her earnestness and her appealing look, won 
upon passers-by ; and well-wishers befriended her, and 
heard her story with amazement. And her story spread, 
and made other well-wishers aid, until at last she came 
to the feet of the emperor. 



The Wanderer. 


They knew — all of them — the tale she had to tell ; 
and the eyes of all pleaded with her so strongly, that 
her request was granted, and the father set free. 

Of course the story glides on very pleasantly after 
this. She has a government coach to carry her back 


148 ABOUT OLD STORY-TELLERS. 

over that long stretch of foot-travel ; she finds her 
parents yet alive ; she somehow has encountered again 
that stray son of the governor of Tobolsk; and I believe 
they were married, and all lived happily ever after. 

It is not much of a love story however, — except of 
parental love, — which, after all, is one of the purest 
kinds of love. 

Madame Cottin, who wrote the story, lived, as I said, 
in the days of the French Revolution, and was married 
in the year 1790, when she was only seventeen years 
old. Her husband was very much older, and a rich 
banker. I doubt if she loved him greatly ; there are 
some things in other books of hers (for she published a 
great many) which make me think so very strongly. 
Still I believe she was an honest woman, and struggled 
to do her duty. I do not think Madame Cottin’ s other 
works are to be commended, or that any one reads them 
very much nowadays. “Elizabeth” — the book of 
which I have given you the story — was printed in the 
time of the First Napoleon (1806), and had an immense 
success. There is hardly a language of Europe in 
which it is not to be found printed now. 

It is a good story. What devotion ! — so rare — so 
true — so tender ! 

Read it for this, if nothing else ; and cherish the 
memory ever in your young hearts. 

It is as good a sermon on the fifth commandment 
as you will ever hear; and remember — that it was 
preached by a Frenchwoman, who lived in Paris 
through the reign of blood. 



VIII. 

FAIRY REALM. 

"The Grimm brothers. 

OT Giant Grim who lives in the “ Pilgrim’s Prog- 



1 ^ ress.” Oh, no ! it is not that sort of person at all, 
about whom I am to tell you, — but of two brothers, who 
were born in Germany, — one at Hanau and the other 
at Cassel, — only a little time before the outbreak of 
that French Revolution of which I have told you 
within the last few pages. 

There were, indeed, five brothers Grimm of this fam- 
ily; but we have concern now only with two, — Jacob 
and William, — who lived much together, and worked 
together with a tender friendliness that is rare, even 
between brothers. Their youth was full of hardships. 
The father died so early that they had only boyish 
remembrances of him ; and the good mother — of whom 
Jacob speaks most tenderly — was left with so small a 
property, that she could with difficulty give them the 
commonest schooling. But pluck and industry, with 
occasional aid from a good aunt, helped them through. 


50 


ABOUT OLD STORY-TELLERS. 


You must have heard of Cassel ; or, if you have ever 
been in Germany, the chances are that you have seen 
it, and the palace and gardens of Wilhelmshohe. 

You will remember, perhaps, that Louis Napoleon 
was sent here after the victory of Sedan. There could 
hardly have been a more delightful prison — where 
he had the liberty of the grounds, and a great throng 
of servants at his command. Every traveller delights 
in wandering under the embowered walks of the palace 
grounds. There are trees and flowers of all climates 
there ; there are statues and grottoes ; there is a foun- 
tain which, when in full blast, throws its water a hun- 
dred and ninety feet into the air — being the highest 
fountain in the world. Then there is a vast flight of 
stone steps, over which the water sometimes comes 
bounding down in torrents ; and these steps lead up to 
the colossal Hercules, whose figure crowns the hill, and 
looks all abroad upon gardens, and mountains, and town. 
But even better worth seeing than this, or than the mu- 
seums stocked with rare and curious things, is the view 
of the lovely valley, which you get from the public 
square of Cassel. 

In the middle of this square stands the statue of the 
Elector Frederic II. Yet he was not a man who de- 
served a statue. He indeed brought together the beau- 
tiful objects in the museum, and adorned the town by 
lavish expenditure. This would have been very well, 
if the moneys had come to him fairly. But how do you 
suppose he won his vast wealth, — of which the traces 
are around one everywhere at Cassel ^ Only by selling 
the lives of his people. 

You will remember, that in any story of the Amerh 


FAIRY REALM. 


151 

can Revolution which you may have read, there is fre- 
quent mention of the “ Hessians ” who fought for 
George of England. 

Well, these “ Hessians,” or hired soldiers, were the 
subjects of the Elector Frederic IL, of Hesse-Cassel, in 
Germany. They were snatched from their homes and 
families, — more than twenty-two thousand of them, 
between the years 1776 and 1784, — and compelled to 
fight over seas, the Elector receiving for their hire 
more than twelve millions of dollars ; and this was a 
sum in that day which would be equal to twenty mil- 
lions now. 

If the brothers Grimm had been of good age in the 
time of the Elector Frederic, they might have died, 
very likely, on the battle-fields of New Jersey. 

But why have I gone over seas to the shadows of 
Wilhelmshohe to find these Grimm brothers } Did 
they ever invent good stories } No. Jacob, indeed, 
told the story of his life ; but there is no invention in 
it, — no fairies in it. He says, — 

‘‘My father was too early taken from us ; and I still 
see in spirit the black coffin, the bearers with the yel- 
low lemons and the rosemary in their hands, pass 
slowly before the window. 

“ We children were brought up in the strict Calvin- 
istic Church : it was rather the effect of practice and 
example, than of much talk. The Lutherans of our 
little town I used to regard as strangers, with whom I 
must not be thoroughly familiar ; and of the Catholics, 
— who were always to be recognized by their gayer 
dress, — I had a strange sort of dread. And I still feel 
as if I could not be thoroughly devout anywhere but in 


52 


ABOUT OLD STORY-TELLERS, 


the church fitted up with the simplicity of the reformed 
faith ; so strongly does all belief attach to the first 
impressions of childhood. 

Love of country was deeply impressed upon our 
hearts, I know not how, for of that, too, little was said ; 
but there was nothing in our parents’ lives or conversa- 
tion which could suggest any other thought : we held 
our prince for the best in the world, our country for 
the most favored of all countries.” 

And yet this was only a very few years after that 
cruel sale of so many Hessian soldiers to be slaughtered 
in battle ; and Jacob Grimm was born in the very year 
— 1785 — in which Frederic II. died. 

But why do I talk of the Grimms } Only because 
these two brothers, of whom I have spoken, gathered 
together, from old libraries, and peasants’ talk, and 
search in every quarter — through years of inquiry — 
a most famous collection of old nursery tales, fairy 
legends, and household stories. 

And you would be surprised, if you were to read 
them through (which I cannot advise), to find how 
many of our old English stories, which we always 
thought must have had their beginning in England, 
were known still earlier, and gave joy and terror to 
young people ages ago, — before ever the present Eng^ 
lish language was known. Thus “ Goody Two Shoes,” 
and “Cinderella,” and “Jack the Giant-Killer,” and 
“Little Red Riding Hood,” have all had their run 
among the young folks of older countries — centuries 
before such books were printed by “good Mr. New- 
bery,” in St. Paul’s Churchyard, in London. There are 
elves and giants, and good spirits and bad spirits, and 


FAIRY REALM. 


153 


talking birds, and singing beasts, doing all manner of 
wondrous things, in these books of the Grimm brothers. 

But you must not think, that, because the brothers 
Grimm were hunting after child’s stories so toilsomely, 
they were men of no learning. They were, in fact, 
most wise and studious men, and are known among 
scholars as the authors of very valuable works relating 
to the German language, to which they devoted years of 



A Trio. 


labor. A son of William — the younger brother — was 
asked one day, by a playmate, about his father’s “ fairy 
stories.” The boy was indignant, and on getting home, 
said, “ Surely, — surely, papa, you never can have writ- 
ten such rubbish. ” 

And is it rubbish ? 

I suppose it must be said — begging young readers 
who still love Tom Thumb, and Bo-peep, to pardon me 


54 


ABOUT OLD STORY-TELLERS, 


— that it is in one sense rubbish; just as you count 
dolls and Noah’s arks rubbish, when you have outgrown 
such toys. But what if you could make a collection of 
all the best dolls and toys and games which have 
amused the children of six centuries past.? Do you 
not think it would tell you a great deal you would like 
to know about the art, the skill, the material resources, 
and the home life of the people who lived so long ago .? 

And so these stories — however much nonsense may 
be in them — throw light upon the language and the 
domestic habits and the tastes of bygone nations ; and 
they show how some strange traditions have held place 
from age to age ; and how certain old stories of elves, 
or giants, or fairies, or goblins have kept life in them, 
when great schemes of philosophy that grew up beside 
them have died, and gone out of remembrance. 

For such reasons these studious German brothers 
gave great care and labor to that collection of house- 
hold stories, into the pages of which you shall now take 
a peep with me. 


7he Gold 'Bird. 

A king had a garden where golden apples grew ; but, 
as they became ripe, one of them was stolen every 
night. The king was angry; and the gardener set 
his sons to watch — turn by turn. The oldest, on his 
night, fell asleep ; the second also fell asleep when his 
turn came ; but the youngest son found that a gold bird 
stole them, and he fired upon it with his bow (of course 
there were no shot-guns), and cut away a golden feather 
from the robber. 




. /• 



A Ride on the Fox^s Tail 


FAIRY REALM. 


155 


This was shown to the king, who found it so beauti- 
ful that he said he must have the bird. 

Then the gardener sent his sons in search of the bird, 
turn by turn, again. The oldest set off, and met a fox ; 
and the fox said to him (for foxes could talk, and cats 
could paint pictures, in that time), You are after the 
Golden Bird — I know: when you have walked all day 
you will come to two inns — one on either side of the 
road ; go into the poorest one, and you will fare best in 
your search.” 

But the boy did not like the squat, small inn, where 
he had been advised to go, but, entering the other, had 
a jolly time there, and forgot the bird, and forgot his 
home, and all at home forgot him. 

Then the second son set off ; and /le met the fox, and 
did not like his talk, and shot an arrow at him. He 
chose the best-looking inn, and had a jolly time; and he 
forgot the bird, and the king forgot him, and he forgot 
his home. 

Then the youngest son went on the search, though the 
gardener was much afraid that harm would come to him 
too. This son met the fox, but he listened patiently 
to Renard ; and, as he was tired, the fox gave him a 
seat upon his tail (as you see in the picture, which was 
made from one of George Cruikshank’s famous designs) ; 
and away he went, with his hair whistling in the wind. 

Of course he minded the fox, and stopped at the 
humble-looking inn : he was not proud like the others. 
In the morning the fox met him, and told him he must 
go all day till he came to a castle, in the courts of 
which castle the soldiers would be all asleep ; he must 
not wake them, but go through the corridors of the 


156 


ABOUT OLD STORY-TELLERS, 


castle till he came to a room where the gold bird would 
be found sitting in a wooden cage. “ But,” said the 
fox, “ you will see a golden cage beside the wooden one : 
do not put the bird in that, or harm will come.” 

Then the young fellow sat again upon the fox’s tail, 
and was whisked away till the morning was gone, and 
the noon, and the sun had set. 

Then, sure enough, he saw the high walls of the 
castle ; and he found the soldiers snoring, and the gold 
bird in the wooden cage, and the stolen apples of gold 
beside it. But the golden cage that stood near by was 
very beautiful ; so he thought he would venture to put 
the golden bird in that ; the king and all the rest would 
like it so much better. 

He had no sooner done so than the bird set up a 
scream that waked all the soldiers, and the soldiers 
waked the guard, and the guard waked the king ; and 
they took him prisoner, and would have killed him. But 
the master of the castle said, “ If he can find the 
golden horse — and bring it to me, he shall have his 
life, and have the golden bird.” 

So the young fellow set off : the fox met him, and I 
dare say gave him a brushing for not having followed 
his advice ; however, he took him upon his tail again in 
search of the golden horse. They went so fast, their 
hair whistled in the wind. But, for all that, the fox 
found breath to tell him he would find the horse in a 
certain castle, with the groom snoring beside him. He 
must not wake the groom, nor put the golden saddle on 
the horse, but an old farm saddle, and then dash away. 

Well, he found the castle, and all the rest ; and he 
thought as the groom slept so soundly he might take 


FAIRY REALM. 


157 


the golden saddle — it was such a splendid one ! But 
no sooner had he put it on the golden horse than the 
groom woke, and the guard came, and the poor fellow, 
was prisoner again. 

However, the people of the castle told him if he could 
bring “ the beautiful princess ” there, he might have 
horse and saddle both. 

So he went out to find “the princess;” and the fox 
met him, and I dare say talked sharply to him ; but he set 
him on his tail again, and whisked him away — so fast 
their hair whistled in the wind — to another castle, 
where the princess lived. The fox told him he must 
snatch his chance to kiss the princess, and then she 
would follow him ; but he must not permit her to say 
adieu to her family. This was a strange order for the 
fox to give, but I suppose Ae knew. 

Now, the young fellow was tender-hearted ; and when 
he had caught the kiss he could not say No, — when 
the poor princess asked to take leave of her father 
and mother. 

Well, this upset every thing again ; the old king said 
he should not have his daughter until he dug away 
a great hill by the castle. This seemed impossible : 
however, the fox helped him — working at night, when 
the young fellow was sleeping off the iatigue of the 
day. 

And after a certain time the hill was gone : the 
young gardener got his princess ; and by means of the 
princess (and the fox) he got the golden horse ; and by 
means of the horse (and the fox) he got the golden bird, 
and with them all rode off toward the country of the 
king of the golden apples. 


158 


ABOUT OLD STORY-TELLERS. 


But the lazy sons, who went to the wrong inn, and 
would not listen to the wise words of the fox, waylaid 
him, and beat him, and took his treasures, and threw 
him in the river. 

But the fox gave him a lift with his bushy tail, and he 
came to shore once more, and went whisking away to 
the kingdom of the golden apples. And when his story 
was told (I dare say the fox made it up for him), the 
lazy, lying brothers were put out of the way, and the 
plodding, straightforward, humble brother got his prin- 
cess, and his horse, and his bird ; and, having given the 
bird to the king, he had the princess for his own, and 
lived very charmingly with her. He did not forget his 
good friend the fox, whom he met one day in the wood 
shortly after ; and the fox entreated him to cut off his 
(the fox’s) head and tail. 

He hesitated a long while ; but, after talking it over 
with the princess, he did as the fox desired. And what 
do you suppose happened then } Why, the fox changed 
into a man — tall and comely, and in a royal purple 
suit ,• and he turned out to be an own brother of the 
princess, who had been lost many years before. 

I suppose he lived with the married pair, and used to 
talk with them of the old days when he was a fox, — 
just as retired merchants talk of the old days when they 
were “in trade.” 


More Queer leasts and People. 

I cannot tell you of one-half the queer things told in 
these books of old German tales, so I must skip about 
from page to page. In one, for instance, I catch sight 


FAIRY REALM. 


159 


of a fox tied by his fore-paws to the branches of two 
trees. How, pray, did this come about ? The story 
says that a wolf, and a fox, and a rabbit, were bent on 
learning to play the violin, and begged a musician to 
teach them. 



The Three Musicians. 


He promised to do so, if they would obey orders. 
So, walking through the wood with them, he ordered the 
wolf to put his paws in the crack of a tree — which he 
did ; and was made fast there — at his lesson. A little 
farther on, he bent down two boughs, and ordered the 
fox to place a paw on each, where the musician tied 
them fast, and left the fox — to his lesson. ' A little far- 
ther on, he bound the rabbit by a silken string to a tree- 
trunk, where he presently, by bouncing about, wound 
himself fast — to his lesson. I suppose they all com- 
menced squeaking and howling, each in his own way — 
which happens to a great many who commence the 
study of music. 



i6o 


ABOUT OLD STORY-TELLERS. 


They worried out of their fastenings at last, and came 
on fast and furious to attack the musician — who had 
meantime taught a man that understood what music 
meant, and who defended his master, as he should. 
The beasts had the worst of it. I don’t know what the 
moral of it is — unless that animals who have no ear 
for music should always keep to their howling and 
squealing, and never attack a good musician — whose 
melody they cannot equal, and whose merit they can- 
not know. 

I espy, too, among the hobgoblins, little English Red 
Riding Hood, or Red-cap as they call her, seated on the 
German ground, with her basket and her pretty ways ; 
and I find there is a new reading to her story. 



Little Red-cap. 


The wolf comes for her — drops soft speeches in her 
ear — but she doubts him: she goes to her grand- 
mamma with her comfits, and tells her how the 
wolf tried to mislead her. 

Then the great wolf comes croaking to the door: 


FAIRY REALM. 


l6l 


he has fine gifts for Grandmamma ; he will be good : 
Riding Hood shall have fine dresses. 

But no : Grandmamma is stern, and keeps the door 
shut. The wolf climbs upon the roof — watching and 
waiting, and waiting — 

When little Red-cap comes out he will snatch her. 
But Grandmamma bethinks herself of some savory 
water she has ; and she and Red-cap fill a great trough 
with it, outside the door. The wolf scents, and sniffs, 
and sniffs, and slips down and down, and stretches his 
neck to reach it — lower and lower — till at last, off he 
goes — souse — into the trough, and is drowned there — 
as all prowling wolves should be who would devour 
sweet little Red-caps. 



The Elves. 


I meet with hosts of little elves who come by moon- 
light and in the dark, and dance on the greensward, and 
hang upon tree-boughs as if they grew there, and bustle 
around babies’ cradles, whispering so softly, in baby’s 
ear, that nurse never hears them. They tease selfish cur- 
mudgeons ; and they help, with the daintiest of fingers, 


i 62 


ABOUT OLD STORY-TELLERS. 


a poor cobbler who is reduced to his last bit of leathet- : 
they transform themselves into awl and hammer, and 
work all through the night, making better shoes than 
the cobbler ever could have made ; and he receives 
double price for their work, and grows prosperous. 

Mr. Cruikshank has made a delicious picture of the 
old cobbler and his wife peeping from behind the doot 
at night, to see these little elves frolicking around his 
bench, and putting on the gay clothes the cobbler’s 
wife has made for the little helpers. The elves put on 
the new clothes, indeed ; but then they dashed away, 
and were heard of no more. 

We talk, you know,, about being in good spirits,” or 
in “bad spirits.” I think those old Germans who 
made these stories would have said instead — the good 
elves have come ; or the bad elves have come. The 
good elves will stay, — unless we try to dress them up 
unnaturally, and extravagantly fine. As for the bad 
ones, — if we never hunt after them at night, or feed 
them with high-spiced dishes, — they will go. 


Hhe Flower with a Pearl. 

One other story I must tell, of a bad fairy — a hag, in 
fact — who lived in a great grim castle. By night she 
became an owl ; by day she was sometimes a cat, with 
her back in a rounded arch. If young girls went within 
a hundred paces of her castle walls, they were changed 
into nightingales, which the bad fairy caught, and hung 
in cages in a certain chamber of her castle. If young 
men came within a hundred paces, they too had a spell 
upon them, so that they could not move except the cruel 
fairy waved her wand, and bade them begone. 


FAIRY REALM. 


163 

Now, Jorinda and Jorindel — who were young people 
of that region — loved each other dearly, and knew all 
about the fairy ; but yet, as lovers will, they wandered out 
by moonlight, without knowing how far they were going. 

Jorinda was singing sweetly, — 

“ The ring-dove sang from the willow spray, — 
Well-a-day ! well-a-day ! 

He mourned for the fate 
Of his lovely mate : 

Well-a-day!” 

Jorindel was listening, as lovers will ; and for a time 
did not know that they had come too near the bad 
fairy’s walls, and that Jorinda was changed, and he was 
listening only to a nightingale. He saw a dreadful owl 
flit by ; and at dawn, lo ! — there came the dreadful fairy 
with her cloak, and her staff, and her cage, and her nose 
and chin almost touching, and carried off Jorinda. He 
could not stir to help her, you know ; and, if he could, 
— how was he to help a nightingale 

Then the hag waved her wand, and bade him begone. 
He begged and pleaded ; but all the more her nose and 
chin came clacking together, and all the more she bade 
him begone. 

In despair he went and became a shepherd — listen- 
ing in the fields at night for the songs of the nightin- 
gales, who reminded him of his darling Jorinda. 

At last, one night he dreamed — that in the meadows 
he found a scarlet flower, with a pearl in the middle of 
it ; and that with this flower he marched straight up to 
the walls of the fairy’s castle, and that at a touch of 
his flower the gates sprang open, and that he saw his 
own Jorinda again. 


ABOUT OLD STORY-TELLERS. 


164 

Next day he hunted to find if such a flower grew in 
those meadows. He hunted long, — day after day, — 
and at last found the treasure. He went straightway — 
though the journey was long — to the castle of the cruel 
old woman. And, sure enough, at a touch of the flower 
the gates swung wide open. In he went, through cor- 
ridor after corridor, till at last he heard the singing 



nightingales ; and, in the room where seven hundred 
cages were hanging, was the wicked fairy with her 
staff. She was mad with rage, but the flower pro- 
tected him. 

He looked around to find Jorinda; for, lover as he 
was, he did not want seven hundred Jorindas. 

Meantime the wicked fairy — while her black cat was 


FAIRY REALM. 


165 


bristling at Jorindel — was bustling out of the door. 
She had seized a cage to take with her. What if this 
were the very nightingale he wanted "i He rushed after 
her ; he touched the cage with his magic flower, and lo ! 
the tender Jorinda, beautiful as ever, stood before him. 

Of course they embraced, as lovers — after a long 
separation — should. Then Jorindel set all the other 
nightingales free ; and the great troop of beautiful 
girls marched out of the castle, and the bad fairy was 
neither found nor heard of again. 

It was a good thing for Jorinda that she had a lover 
who was constant, and who could find a flower with a 
pearl in it. 


1 



IX. 

A SCOTCH MAGICIAN. 

Ivanhoe. 

I DON’T think I shall ever forget my first reading 
of Scott’s story of “Ivanhoe” — not if I live to 
be as old as Dr. Parr. 

It was about the time when I was half through 
Adams’s Latin Grammar (which nobody studies now). 
I was curled up in an easy-chair, with one of those gilt- 
backed volumes in my hand, which made a long array 
in a little upstairs book-case of a certain stone house 
that fronts the sea. Snowing, I think, and promising 
good sliding down hill (we knew nothing about any such 
word as “coasting” in those days). But snow and 
sleds and mittens were all forgotten in that charming 
story, where I saw old Saxon England, and the brave 
Coeur de Lion who was king, and a pretty princess, 
and dashing men-at-arms, and heard clash of battle, 
and bugle notes, and prayerful entreaties of a sweet 
Jewess, and anthems in old abbeys. 

All these so lingered in my mind, that when, years 

i66 



A SCOTCH MAGICIAN. 


167 


after, I went rambling through England, I wandered one 
day all around the town of Ashby-de-la-Zouche to find 
— if it might be found — the old tournament-ground 
where was held the famous fete that opens so grandly 
the story of “ Ivanhoe ; ” and, in going through Sher- 
wood Forest (what is left of it), I think the Robin Hood 
of Scott’s story was as lively in my thought as the 
Robin Hood of the old ballads. 

And now the story must be told over in a few pages. 
A few pages ! Ah, there was a time when I wished the 
two hundred pages could be stretched into five hundred ! 
I hear the young people of our day complain that they 
can’t like the long talks and the long descriptions ; and 
that Scott’s books are too slow for them. Well, well ' 
I know that the day of chivalry, and of men-at-arms 
and “ knights caparisoned,” is gone by ; but there art 
old heads into which the din of those gone-by times does 
come at odd intervals, floating musically, — and never 
so musically as on the pages of Scott. What if we try 
to whisk a little of this music into a page of story ? 

The first scene shows a swineherd, with rough jerkin ; 
his tangled hair is his only cap, and a brass band is 
around his neck, and he is talking with the fool Wamba, 
who sits upon a bank in the forest. They are the serfs 
of an old Saxon named Cedric, who lives near by, in a 
great, sprawling, half-fortified country-house. And when 
Gurth, the swineherd, and Wamba go home at night, 
there is met a great company in the hall of Cedric, 
their master. A famous Templar knight. Sir Brian du 
Bois-Guilbert, is there with his retinue ; and Cedric has 
seated by him Rowena, a beautiful princess, who is liv- 
ing under his guardianship ; and there is a pilgrim from 


i68 


ABOUT OLD STORY-TELLERS. 


the Holy Land in the company, — who is a disguised 
knight (and the son of Cedric, but has been disinher- 
ited by the father because he has dared to love the beau- 
tiful Rowena) ; and there is a rich old white-bearded 



Swineherd and Wamba. 


Jew, — Isaac of York, — who is buffeted by the com- 
pany, but who is richer than them all. The timber roof 
of the apartment is begrimed with smoke, that rises 
from a great fireplace at the end of the hall. Yet the 
meats are good, and there is wine and ale. There is 
talk of the battles of the Crusaders in Palestine, and of 


A SCOTCH MAGICIAN. 


169 


the valiant deeds of Richard the Lion-hearted, who is 
a prisoner (or thought to be) somewhere on the Conti- 
nent ; and there is talk, too, of the great tournament at 
Ashby, where all the company is going on the morrow. 

But no one knows the secret of the disguised pilgrim, 
who at dawn next day steals out secretly, — taking 
Gurth with him, and telling the swineherd who he 
really is. He befriends the Jew too; and so, through 
his aid, procures a steed and new armor for the battle 
of the tournament. 


The Tournament. 

It was a gorgeous scene at Ashby. Prince John, the 
usurping king (brother to Richard), was there with his 
court, and Rowena — beautiful as ever ; and still more 
beautiful was Rebecca, the “ peerless daughter ” of the 
Jew, Isaac of York. Of course there was, too, a great 
crowd of Saxon knights and of Norman barons, and of 
people of all degrees, — such a crowd, in short, as 
gathers at one of our great fairs or races. But remem- 
ber that very few of the great people, even in this gath- 
ering of Richard Coeur de Lion’s day, could write their 
own names ; and it was a long time before there was 
any such thing in existence as a printed book. But yet 
I think the show of fine feathers and silks, and coquetry, 
was as great then as it would be in any such great as- 
semblage now. 

Well, in all the knightly sports of the early part of 
the day, Bois-Guilbert was easily chief ; but before the 
day ended, a new knight made his appearance on the 
field, with visor down, unknown to all, and with only this 


70 


ABOUT OLD STORY-TELLERS. 


device on his shield, — a young oak torn up by the 
roots, and the word ‘‘Disinherited.” Everybody ad- 
mired his motions and his carriage ; and everybody 
trembled when he rode bravely up to the tents of the 
challengers, and smote the shield of Bois-Guilbert with 
the point of his lance. This meant deadly strife ; while, 
before this time, all the combats had been with blunted 
javelins. 



A Strange Knight. 


So the knights took up position, and at a blast from 
the trumpets dashed forward into the middle of the 
lists, and met with a shock that must have been a fear- 
ful thing to see. Neither was unhorsed, though the 
lances of both were shattered in splinters. At the 
second trial, Bois-Guilbert rolled over in the dust, and 
the strange knight (whose real name was Ivanhoe) was 
declared victor. 

The air rang with shouts, and Ivanhoe rode around 
the lists to single out a fair lady who should be queen 


A SCOTCH MAGICIAN. 



of the next day’s fete. Of course he chose Rowena, 
the Saxon princess, who sat beside Athelstane, who 
was of royal Saxon blood and was her declared lover, 
and favored by Cedric, who sat also beside her. 

But neither Cedric, nor Rowena, nor Prince John 
knew who the strange knight could be, since he had re- 
fused to lift the visor 
of his helmet, or to de- 
clare his name. The 
Jew, Isaac of York, 
doubtless knew the 
steed and the armor, 
and may have whis- 
pered what he knew 
to Rebecca ; for when 
Ivanhoe at evening 
sent his man Gurth 
to pay the Jew for his 
equipments, the beau- 
tiful Rebecca detained 
the messenger at the 
door, and paid him 
back the money — and 
more ; saying that so 

true and good a knight, and tha Massanger. 

who had befriended 
her father, owed him nothing. 

This was a most splendid thing for Rebecca to do, 
we all thought. 

The next day, there was a little army on each side in 
the contest ; Bois-Guilbert leading one, and Ivanhoe the 
other. For a long time the result was doubtful ; but at 


172 


ABOUT OLD STORY-TELLERS. 


last Ivanhoe was beset by three knights at once, — Bois- 
Guilbert, Athelstane, and Front de Boeuf ; and surely 
would have been conquered if a new party had not ap- 
peared. This was a gigantic knight in black armor, 
with no device, and who had acted the sluggard. He 
rode up at sight of Ivanhoe’ s sore need, and, with a 
careless blow or two from mace or battle-axe, sent Front 
de Boeuf and Athelstane reeling in the dust. After 
this, the victory of Ivanhoe was easy and complete. 

They led him up to receive the crown from Rowena, 
the queen of the fete ; and they unloosed his helmet, 
though he made signs to them to forbear ; and Cedric 
knew his son, and Rowena knew her lover, and Prince 
John knew the favorite of the wronged King Richard, 
whose power he was usurping. 

But the poor knight was wounded grievously ; and, 
taking off his corslet, the attendants found a spear-head 
driven into his breast. And he was taken away to be 
cared for, — none knew exactly by whom ; but it ap- 
peared afterward that it was by those in the employ of 
Rebecca, who, like many ladies of that day, was a great 
mistress of the healing craft. 


:>1 Castle. 

A day or two later, as I remember, he was journey- 
ing in a litter under care of the Jew and Rebecca, 
who were attacked by outlaws ; and, after this, claimed 
the protection of Cedric and Athelstane, and their com- 
pany, who also were journeying through the same re- 
gion ; but these latter did not know who was the 
wounded man in the litter. Even if they had known. 


A SCOTCH MAGICIAN. 


173 


they could not have protected him against the enemies 
who presently beset them ; for they all were taken cap- 
tive, and lodged in the great castle of Front de Boeuf. 

Ah, what a castle it was ! What dungeons ! What 
mysterious posterns ! What embrasures, and courts, 
and turrets, and thick walls, and secret passages ! 

I see in one of its dungeons the old Jew, appealing to 
Front de Boeuf, who threatens to draw out his teeth one 



Front de Boeuf and the Jew. 


by one, or to roast him by the dungeon fire, if he will 
not disgorge his money. 

I see Rebecca, beautiful and defiant, wooed by Bois- 
Guilbert as captives are always wooed by conquerors, 
until with proud daring she threatens to throw herself 
from the embrasure of the window, headlong down the 
walls. 

I see Ivanhoe stretched upon his sick-couch, helpless, 


74 


ABOUT OLD STORY-TELLERS. 


and listening yearningly to the sounds that come up 
from the castle walls. I see the beautiful Rebecca — 
who is in attendance upon him (we boys were all so 
glad of that I ) — exposing herself to chance arrows from 
Robin Hood’s band, who are attacking the castle, only 
that she may look out and report to the poor knight 
Ivanhoe how the battle is going. She says a giant in 
black armor is heading the attacking party, and that 
he thunders with his great battle-axe upon the postern 
gate as if the might of an army were in his hand. She 
says the men go down under his strokes as if God’s 
lightning had smitten them. He knows who it must 
be. It is — it can be no other than the Black Sluggard 
of the tournament — Richard I. of England! 

“Look again, Rebecca.” 

“ God of Abraham 1 They are toppling over a great 
stone from the battlements ; it must crush the brave 
knight I ” 

Poor Ivanhoe ! Poor captives I 

“ But no, he is safe ; he is thundering at the gate ; it 
splinters under his blows I Ah, the blood I the trampled 
men ! Great God I are these thy children ? ” 

Yet even now there are inner and higher walls of the 
castle to be climbed or battered down. Never would 
they have been taken except there had been treachery 
within. A wretched woman — Ulrica, victim of Front 
de Boeuf — has set a match to a great store of fuel, and 
smoke and flame belch out : the defenders have fires to 
fight, and their outposts are weakened ; and the attack- 
ing party press on, and secure the citadel. I seem to 
see smoke and flame, and crushing towers, under whose 
ruins lie buried Front de Boeuf and the miserable Ulrica. 


A SCOTCH MAGICIAN. 


175 

I see Cedric disguised as priest, and making his es- 
cape, and flinging back bribes in scorn. 

Then, upon a patch of greensward under the shadow 
of a near grove of oaks, the victors gather slowly to 
measure their spoil. 

The Saxon Rowena is safe — so is the Jew and 
Cedric. Athelstane has received what seems his death- 



wound. Ivanhoe has been snatched out of the jaws of 
destruction by the arm of King Richard, who bids 
Cedric be reconciled with his son ; which bidding, the 
old Saxon curmudgeon cannot deny ; and he is half dis- 
posed — now that the royal lover Athelstane is out of 
the way — to favor the pretensions of Ivanhoe to the 
hand and heart of Rowena. Robin Hood, in his suit of 
green, gets free grace for all his misdeeds as outlaw, 



176 ABOUT OLD STORY-TELLERS. 

and with one of his “merry men,” — a certain jolly friar 
of Copmanhurst, who does not know the secret of the 
Black Knight, — the easy-going, stalwart king has a 
sparring-match (which to every boy reader of our time 
was delightful) ; and which ended with putting the great 
jolly friar sprawling in the dirt. What a brave, stout 
king was Richard, to be sure ! 

But the only real grief among all who have been res- 
cued is shown by the poor old Jew — not so much for the 
moneys which the barons and the church people have 
shorn him of, as for his daughter. The sweet Rebecca 
has not been crushed, indeed, in the ruin of the castle ; 
but she has been borne away a captive by a knight who 
was none other than the wicked Templar, Bois-Guilbert. 
Whither, none knew ; nor does the story of her seizure 
come to the ears of Ivanhoe (for which, I fear, Row- 
ena was glad), who is borne away to some religious 
house, where he will have more orthodox, — though not 
more gentle care than the tender Rebecca would have 
rendered. 

After this, I seem to see a great crowd of mourners 
in some old monastery or religious house of some sort, 
bewailing (with good eating and flagons of ale) the lost 
Athelstane ; and in the middle of the funeral feast — 
which the king had honored with his presence, and 
Rowena, and the knight Ivanhoe — lo! Athelstane him- 
self, with his grave-clothes on him, suddenly appears ! 
Good old Walter Scott loved such surprises as he loved 
a good dinner. The royal Saxon lover of Rowena was 
not really dead, but had only been stunned by a fearful 
blow. But the blow has cleared his brain, and made 
him see that Rowena cares more for the little finger of 


A SCOTCH MAGICIAN, 1 77 

Ivanhoe than for his whole body ; so he tells Cedric he 
gives up his claim. 

And what does Ivanhoe say } 

There is no Ivanhoe to be found. A mysterious mes- 
senger has summoned him away ; and, though scarce 
able to sit his horse for his sore wounds, he has put on 
his armor, and dashed through the outlying forests. 
He rides hard, and he rides fast, for there is a dear life 
at stake. Whose } 

(If we were writing a novel, we should say “Chapter 
Second” here, and make a break. Then we should 
begin ) 


Rebecca. 

We return now to Rebecca. Bois-Guilbert had in- 
deed borne her away, and had lodged her in a great 
house that belonged to the Knights Templars. But the 
Grand Master of the Templars, to whom Bois-Guilbert 
owed obedience, was a very severe man, and a very curi- 
ous, prying man ; and he found out speedily what Bois- 
Guilbert had done ; and he found out that this young 
woman, beautiful as she was, was a Jewess ; and there 
were some among the Templars who said she was a 
sorceress too, and had practised her sorcery upon Bois- 
Guilbert. So this Grand Master of the Templars 
brought the poor girl to trial for sorcery, though she 
was the most Christian and most lovable creature in the 
whole book ! 

It was a sorry, sham trial: the Templars all on one 
side, and the poor Jewess on the other ; — for the miser- 
able fellow, Bois-Guilbert, was afraid to open his mouth 


/ 


178 


ABOUT OLD STORY-TELLERS. 


in her defence. He told her, indeed, that he would 
save her, and run off with her if she would go ; but she 
scorned him with a most brave and beautiful scorn. 
Of course she came off badly at the trial, — as they 
meant she should. She was condemned to be burned. 
Only one chance for escape was left, — she might sum- 
mon a knight to her defence, who must contend against 
the bravest and strongest of the Templars. If her cham- 
pion won, she might go free ; if he failed by a hair’s 
breadth, the fagots would be kindled around her. 

But who would defend a Jewess } Who would be 
champion for a suspected sorceress } 

She craved the privilege of sending out a messenger, 
in faint hope of finding a champion. And the messen- 
ger rode — a good fellow — rode fast, rode far; ’twas he 
that found Ivanhoe, and ’twas with him that the good 
knight left the scene of Athelstane’s coming to life. 

The morning came. The fagots were piled up ; the 
match-fire was ready ; the Templars were all gathered ; 
the stout Brien du Bois-Guilbert, armed cap-a-pie, was 
ready for any champion ; the great warning-bell began 

tolling — One! two I three 

What dust is that rising yonder } It is — it is a 
knight — in full armor ; he approaches — he comes in 
plain sight. It is Ivanhoe ; but ah I so weak, so wearied, 
so wasted by his sickness ! There is but little hope for 
poor Rebecca. But he enters the lists ; he braver the 
challenger ; the trumpet sounds ; the steeds dash a^way 
to the encounter, and the crash of meeting comes. 

The Grand Master strains his eyes to see what figures 
shall come out from the cloud of dust. One is down, — 
prostrate utterly, — dying. Of course it must be 



Rebecca’s Trial 


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A SCOTCH MAGICIAN, 


i8i 


enfeebled and fatigued Ivanhoe. But no — no — it is 
not ! It is Bois-Guilbert who is dying. 

And what is this new cloud of dust and tramp of cav- 
alry ? It is Richard of England, who has followed hard 
upon the track of Ivanhoe ; for he has heard of his er- 
rand, and knows he is unfit to encounter the strongest 
of the Templar Knights. He has brought a squadron 
of armed men with him, too, to seize upon all traitors in 



The Champion. 


the ranks of the Templars ; and lo ! above the roof and 
towers of the Grand Master of the Templars, the royal 
standard of England is even now floating in the breeze. 
And Rebecca is safe, and Ivanhoe is safe. 

And did he marry her ? 

Ah, no ! He married the Saxon Rowena ; and they 
had a grand wedding in York Minster, where now you 
may see the pavement on which they walked. 

One day after the wedding, — it may have been a 


1 82 ABOUT OLD STORY-TELLERS. 

week later, — a visitor asked an interview with the 
bride. The visitor was a closely veiled lady of most 
graceful figure. You guess who it was, — Rebecca. 
She brought a gift for the bride of Ivanhoe, — a gor- 
geous necklace of diamonds, — so magnificent that 
Rowena felt like refusing the gift. 

“ I pray you take them, dear lady,” said Rebecca. 
“I owe this, and more, to the good knight, — your 
honored” — Here she broke down ; but she recovered 
herself presently — kissed the hand of Rowena — passed 
out. 

I think Rowena was glad her visitor did not meet 
Ivanhoe upon the stairs ; I think she was glad, too, that 
the lovely Rebecca went over seas presently to Spanish 
Granada ; though she pretended not to be. 

I know if I had been Ivanhoe But we will not 

try to mend a story of Scott’s ; least of all, when we 
crowd one of his novels into a few pages, as we have 
done here. 


Waller ScolVs Eome. 

It is among the very earliest recollections of my 
school-days, — that the master, after some exercise in 
reading, told us youngsters — with a grave face — that 
the great author Sir Walter Scott was dead. And I 
think some lout of a boy down the bench — with a big 
shock of hair, and who was a better hand at marbles 
than he ever was at books — said, in a whisper that 
two or three of us caught, — “I wonder who under the 
canopy he was } ” 

I don’t think that, for any of us, Scott was so large a 


A SCOTCH MAGICIAN. 


183 


man, that time, as Peter Parley, — who, if I remember 
rightly, was at about that date writing his little square 
books of “Travels” in strange lands. 

It was at a later day that we boys began to catch 
the full flavor of Waverley, and the Heart of Mid- 
Lothian, and of that glorious story of battles and single- 
handed fights in which the gallant Saladin and the 
ponderous Richard of the Lion Heart took part. We 
may possibly have read at that tender age his “ Tales 
of a Grandfather ” (which will make good reading for 
young people now) ; and we may have heard our lady 
kinsfolk talk admiringly of the Lady of the Lake, 
and of Marmion ; but we did not measure fairly the 
full depth of the school-master’s grave manner, when he 
told us, in 1832, that Walter Scott was dead. 

For my part, when I did get into the full spirit of 
Guy Mannering and of Ivanhoe, some years later, it 
seemed to me a great pity that a man who could 
make such books should die at all, — and a great pity 
that he should not go on writing them to the latest 
generation of men. And I do not think that I had 
wholly shaken off this feeling, when I wandered twelve 
years later along the Tweed, — looking sharply out in 
the Scotch mist that drifted among the hollows of the 
hills, for the gray ruin of Melrose Abbey. 

I knew that this beautiful ruin was near to the old 
homestead of Walter Scott, toward which I had set off 
on a foot pilgrimage, a day before, from the old border- 
town of Berwick-upon-Tweed. If you have read any 
Scottish history, or if you have read Miss Porter’s 
great story (as we boys thought it) of “The Scottish 
Chiefs,” you will have beard of this old border-town. 


i 84 about old story-tellers. 

I had kept close along the banks of the river, — seeing 
men drawing nets for salmon, — seeing charming fields 
green with the richest June growth, — seeing shepherds 
at sheep-washing on Tweedside, — seeing old Norham 
Castle, and Coldstream Bridge, and the palace of the 
Duke of Roxburgh. I had slept at Kelso, — had 
studied the great bit of ruin which is there, and had 
caught glimpses of Teviotdale, and of the Eildon Hills ; 
I had dined at a drover’s inn of St. Boswell’s ; I had 
trudged out of my way for a good look at Smaillholme 
Tower, and at the farmhouse of Sandy Knowe — both 
which you will find mention of, if you read (as you 
should) Lockhart’s Life of Scott. Dryburgh Abbey, 
with its gloom, and rich tresses of ivy vines, — where 
the great writer lies buried, — came later in the day ; 
and at last, in the gloaming (which is the pretty Scotch 
word for twilight), a stout oarsman ferried me across a 
stream, and I toiled foot-sore into the little town of Mel- 
rose. There is not much to be seen there but the 
Abbey in its ghostly ruin. I slept at the George Inn, 
dreaming — as I dare say you would have done — of 
Ivanhoe, Rebecca, and border wars and Old Mortality. 

Next morning, after a breakfast upon trout which had 
been taken from some near stream (was it the Yarrow ?) 
I strolled two miles or so down the road, and by a little 
green foot-gate entered upon the grounds of Abbots- 
ford — which was the home that Walter Scott created, 
and the home where he died. 

The forest trees — not over-high at that time — under 
which I walked were those which he had planted. I 
found his favorite out-of-door seat, — sheltered by a 
thicket of arbor-vitae trees, — from which there could 


A SCOTCH MAG/C/A AT. 


185 


be caught a glimpse of the rippled surface of the 
Tweed, and a glimpse of the many turrets which 
crowned the house of Abbotsford. 

It was all very quiet ; quiet in the walks through the 
wide-stretching wood ; and quiet as you came to the 
court-yard and doorway of the beautiful house. I think 
there was a yelp from some young hound in an out- 
building ; there was a little twitter from some birds I 
did not know with my American eyes ; there was the 
pleasant and unceasing murmur of the river, rustling- 
over its broad, pebbly bed. Beside these sounds the 
silence was unbroken ; and when I rang the bell at the 
entrance door, the echoes of it fairly startled me, — 
and they startled a little terrier too, whose quick, sharp 
bark rang noisily through the outer court of the great 
building. 

This seemed very dismal. Where, pray, were Tom 
Purdy, and Laidlaw, and Maida, and Sibyl Gray.^ 
For you must remember I was, in that day, fresh from 
a first reading of Lockhart’s Life of Scott, in which 
all these — and many more — appear, and give life and 
stir to the surroundings of this home of Abbotsford. 

You will read that book of Lockhart’s some day, and 
you will find in it — that Tom Purdy was an old out-of- 
door servant of Scott’s, who looked after the plantation 
and the dogs, and always accompanied the master upon 
his hunting frolics and his mountain strolls. Laidlaw 
did service in a more important way in-doors, — reading 
and writing for the master of the house. Maida was a 
noble stag-hound, whom Scott loved almost as much as 
any creature about him, and of whom he has left a 
charming portrait in old “ Bevis,” — whose acquaintance 


l86 ABOUT OLD STORY-TELLERS, 

you will make whenever you come to read the tale of 
“Woodstock.” As for Sibyl Gray, it was the name 
of the stout nag which carried Scott safely through 
fords and fens. 

But, as I said, there were none of them to be seen on 
that morning — thirty odd years ago — at Abbotsford. 
I could not even be sure that the terrier which set up 
so shrill and discordant a barking belonged to that 
sharp “ Mustard ” family, which traces back to Dandie 
Dinmont’s home in Guy Mannering. 

Only an old housekeeper was in charge ; who, though 
she might have seen service in the family, had fallen 
into that parrot-like way of telling visitors what things 
were best worth seeing, that frets one terribly who goes 
to such a place with the memory of old stories glow- 
ing in his thought. What would you or I care, — 
fresh from Ivanhoe, — whether a certain bit of carving 
came from Jedburgh, or from Kelso ? What should we 
care about the number of jets in the chandelier in the 
great hall } What should we care about the way in 
which Prince Somebody — wrote his name in the visit- 
ors’ book ? 

But when we catch sight of the desk at which the mas- 
ter wrote, or of the chair in which he sat, and of his 
shoes, and coat, and cane, — looking as if they might 
have been worn only yesterday, — this seems to bring 
us nearer to the man who has written so much to cheer 
and charm the world. There was too, I remember, a 
little box in the corridor, — simple and iron-bound, — 
with the line written below it, — “ Post will close at 
two.” 

It was as if we had heard the master of the house say 
it to a guest, — “ The post will close at two.” 


A SCOTCH MAGICIAN. 


187 


Perhaps the notice was in his own handwriting, — per- 
haps not ; yet somehow, more than the library, more 
than the portrait bust of the dead author, — more than 
all the chatter of the well-meaning housekeeper, — it 
brought back the halting old gentleman in his shooting- 
coat, and with his ivory-headed cane, — hobbling with a 
vigorous pace along the corridor, to post in that old 
iron-bound box a chapter — maybe, of Ivanhoe. 



The Chair, Coat, and Cane. 


But no : Ivanhoe was written before this great pile 
of Abbotsford v/as finished. Indeed, the greater part 
of his best work was done under a roof much more 
homely and modest, — perhaps at a farmhouse he 
once occupied some miles away on the Esk, — per- 
haps in the humbler building which was overbuilt 
and swamped in this great pile of masonry. 



i88 


ABOUT OLD STORY-TELLERS. 


It is not old, as you may think : it has a vexing 
look of newness for those who love his tales of the 
Covenanters. Of course it was more vexing thirty-three 
years ago than now ; but even now, if you go there, 

— and all who go to Scotland are tempted to run down 
over that thirty miles of distance which separates it 
from Edinboro’, — you will still find none of the ven- 
erable oldness, which — going from our new country — ' 
we love to meet. 

The walls and halls of that house of Abbotsford are 
fine ; but there are far finer ones to be seen in England 
and Scotland. I do not know what mosses may have 
grown over it during these thirty-three years last past, 
to make it venerable ; but — that number of years ago, 
it wore a showy newness that was quite shocking to one 
that had learned to think (from his books) that dear old 
Walter Scott should have lived all his life sheltered by 
a mossy roof, and by walls mellowed in their hue by the 
storms, and stains, and suns of centuries. 

I found no whit of this about Abbotsford. You 
know, I dare say, that it had been only a little while his 
home at the time of his death : only twice after its 
completion had all the great rooms been thrown open, 

— once when his son Capt. Walter Scott, of the Royal 
Hussars, was married to a Highland heiress ; and again 
when Sir Walter Scott, baronet and author, lay in state 
there, and the house was thronged with mourners. 

Its turrets and great stretch of courts and corridors 
and halls tell a mournful story of that weak ambition in 
him which sought to dignify in this way a great family 
pride. It was an ambition that was not gratified in his 
lifetime ; and now there is not one of his lineage or 
name to hold possession of it. 


A SCOTCH MAGICIAN. 


189 


Eow and When Ee wrote. ^ 

It is not so very long ago that Scott wrote his 
charming stories : — since Goldsmith — long since 
Dr. Swift — since Miss Edgeworth made her fame 
(though he died before she died) ; indeed, he is fearer 
to our times than any I have spoken of, or shall speak 
of, in this budget of “Old Story-Tellers.” There are 
those alive who remember well the great mystery about 
the Waverley Novels; — for, while everybody was read- 
ing them, nobody could say certainly who wrote them. 

Scott did not place his name upon the title-page of 
these books ; he did not allow it to be known for years 
— even among his intimate friends — who wrote them. 
There were those who went to his home, and staid 
there day after day, — joining him in his rambles over 
the gray hills, — listening to his dinner tales, and the 
snatches of old songs he loved to recite, — who said it 
could never be Walter Scott, who wrote the tales at 
which the world was wondering ; for what time could 
such a man find for such amazing work } 

But there were keener ones who noted that the mas- 
ter of the house never, or very rarely, showed himself 
to his guests until after ten in the morning ; and be- 
tween that hour and sunrise — at which time he rose — 
those who were most familiar with him knew that this 
wonderful work was done. Never, I suppose, did any 
literary man work more rapidly. Writing thus, and 
aiming only at those broad effects which enchanted the 
whole world of readers, — he could not and did not give 
that close attention to his sentences which Goldsmith 


igo ABOUT OLD STORY-TELLERS. 

and Swift both gave, and which makes their writings 
far safer and better as models of style. He wrote so 
swiftly, and dashed so strongly into the current of what 
he had to say, that he was careless about every thing 
except what went to engage the reader, and enchain his 
attention. 

But do you say that this is the very best aim of all 
writing } Most surely it is wise for a writer to seek to 
engage attention ; and failing of this, he must fail of 
any further purpose ; but if he gains this by simple 
means, — by directness, — by clear, limpid language, 
and no more words than the thought calls for, — and 
such rhythmic and beguiling use of them as tempts the 
reader to keep all in mind, he is a safer example to fol- 
low than one who, by force of genius, can bring into 
large use extravagant expressions, and great redundance 
of words. 

Scott has in one of his stories — “The Talisman ” — 
an account of a trial of prowess between Saladin, the 
Eastern monarch, and our old friend, Richard the Lion- 
hearted. They are together somewhere on one of those 
fairy islets of green, which are scattered over the sandy 
wastes of Palestine. The subjects of both monarchs 
are gathered together : there is peace between them 
for the time ; they mingle in friendly games. The great 
Saxon king — that is, Richard — wishes to astonish and 
impress those light-limbed warriors of the East : so he 
takes a great iron mace, or, as we might say, a solid 
iron bludgeon, and lays it upon a block which he has 
ordered to be brought into the presence of Saladin and 
his attendant chieftains. Then he raises his great two- 
handed broad-sword, — not over-sharp, but immensely 


A SCOTCH MAGICIAN. 


191 


heavy, — and, sweeping it through the air, brings it 
down with a mighty thwacK upon the iron bludgeon, 
which straightway falls clanging in two pieces, — cleft 
apart by the force of the king’s blow. 

The light cimeter and the light arm of Saladin can 
do no such thing as this : the men of Palestine know 
it ; the British warriors — looking on — all know it, 
and cannot keep down a shout of triumph. 

What then does Saladin, — whose turn to show his 
prowess has now come } He can cleave no iron mace : 
he looks upon the cleft bludgeon with as much wonder 
as any. He tests coolly the edge of his cimeter : he 
knows its keenness ; he knows what swiftness and 
surety he can give to its sweep. He takes a scarf of 
silken gauze — so fine that spiders might have woven 
it, — so light, it seems to float on the air, as the Saladin 
tosses it from him. Then — quick as lightning, he 
draws his cimeter — strikes at the silken gauze, and 
the scarf, cleanly divided, drifts in two parcels down 
the wind. 

Though we may admire almost evenly (as Scott 
meant we should) these feats of hand, it is certain we 
could never approach the doughty doing of Richard 
unless we were possessed of his gigantic power of 
muscle ; but skill and practice would bring one to a very 
close approach to the deft accomplishment of Saladin. 

Now, why have I brought in this little side-scene from 
the Talisman } You must remember that I was talk- 
ing of words and style. Do you see now my intent 
A man of genius — well informed as to his subject- 
matter, and full of enthusiasm — may be sure of tri- 
umph, through whatever cumbersome welter of words ; 


192 ABOUT OLD STORY-TELLERS. 

but a better example for you and for me to study, will 
be the work of one who gained his victories by simple, 
clear-cut sentences, that carry no burden of repetitions, 
and strike straight and sharp to the mark. 

Eis Life and Ways. 

But how came this man to write at all ? His father, 
who was a quiet old gentleman in Edinburgh, believed 



The boy Walter Scott. 


and hoped that this son Walter would keep on with him 
in that steady office-work — it was of a legal sort — in 
which he himself grew old. He had fears indeed, when 
Walter was a boy, that he would slip from life early ; 
for he had a grievous illness that left him a crippled 
man always, — not indeed badly crippled, but with a 


A SCOTCH MAGICIAN. 


193 


slight limp in his walk, which made his cane a thing of 
real service to him. He was a well-looking boy, — as 
you may see from this little picture of him in his child- 
hood ; and much of his time was passed with his grand- 
parents and relatives out by Kelso, or Sandy Knowe ; 
and I think he grew into a love for that region, and 
for all of Teviotdale, and Tweedside, which he never 
outgrew. 

He did put himself to work, when the time came for 
it, in the office of his father ; but he did not bring a 
strong love for it. 

He had read ballads out at Sandy Knowe, and had 
listened to old wives’ tales, — in those days of his ill- 
ness, — which stuck by him ; and the Eildon Hills, and 
the blue line of the Cheviots, I dare say kept coming 
into view, over his desk in Castle Street, Edinburgh. 

There were young fellows too in the city — friends of 
his — who loved the heather, and border tales, and old 
lore, as well as he ; and we may be sure they had their 
junketings together, and that the legal work was none 
the better for it. There were certain ballads in their 
times, translated from the German, so daintily done, 
that they passed from hand to hand among the literary 
people of Edinburgh ; and the story ran that the pretty 
and musical translations were the work of Walter 
Scott, — a presentable young man, of some six feet in 
height, with a tall forehead, and bushy eyebrows, and 
a limp in his gait. 

Then came a volume or two of collected Scottish 
minstrelsy, — much of the best work in them known to 
have been done by the same Walter Scott, and pub- 
lished with his name. 


194 


ABOUT OLD STORY-TELLERS. 


It did not help the law business ; and when a jingling, 
charming poem, full of the spirit of old balladry, and 
called “The Lay of the Last Minstrel,” appeared 
under his name, it hurt the law business still more; 
and we may well believe that the old gentleman — his 
father — shook his head despairingly. 

But he received five or six hundred pounds for it, — 
which was better worth than two or three years of his 
law work. 

Still, he tells us, he hesitated: should he give up 
rhyme-making, and keep close to his office } 

Well, if he had done so, we might possibly have 
had the Decisions of Justice Scott, in law calf; but 
should we have had “ Ivanhoe ” ? 

His poems had a taking, jingling resonance, and a 
fire, and a dash, and bold rich painting of Scotch scenery 
in them, that made them the delight of all England and 
Scotland. Everybody talked of the young Mr. Scott. 

He married in this time a pretty Miss Carpenter, who 
was the orphan daughter of a French mother, and 
under the guardianship of Lord Downshire. This was 
very much against the wish of the elder Scotts. They 
were too old-fashioned to think well of French blood. 
But I believe she made a good wife, though she never 
got over her broken English, and always had over-due 
respect for titles ; and never, I think, had full and deep 
sympathy with the higher impulses of the great Scotch- 
man, or any wise appreciation of his best work. Per- 
haps I ought not to say this : certainly there was never 
any lack of that affection, on both sides, which is, after 
all, the thing that is most sure to make lasting domestic 
happiness. 


A SCOTCH MAGICIAN. 


195 


Scott’s poems are not yet, I think, wholly gone by. 
Marmion and the Lady of the Lake are still read, 
and are worth the reading, were it only for their charm- 
ing glimpses of Scotch landscape ; and if you ever go 
to Inversnaid and Loch Katrine, or sleep at one of the 
little ivy-embowered inns among the Trosachs, or look 
off from the heights of Stirling Castle, — you will be 
glad these old poems are still printed, and that you have 
read them. And, if you never visit those places, a read 
ing of the poems will almost carry you there. 

But Mr. Scott could not go on making poems forever : 
he had lifted all the blinding mists from those charming 
Scotch lakes ; but when he carried his eight-syllabled 
music — which was ringing in everybody’s ears — to 
England and “ Rokeby,” there was a pause in the wel- 
comes that had greeted him. Besides, Byron had begun 
his chant in a new and more brilliant strain. 

There was wisdom in his decision to strike a new 
note in Waverley, and Guy Mannering, — a note that is 
ringing yet. The clash of Marmion we only catch the 
hearing of here and there, at long intervals ; but it is 
very hard, I think, to go where you will not meet those 
who know Dominie Samson, and Meg Merrilies. 

Do you ask what I would counsel you to read among 
these novels of Scott ? 

Well — well ! Does the maple, or the ash, or the 
pepperidge, or the dogwood show a richer color in 
autumn ? Which of these shall we gather ? which shall 
we leave ungathered } 

Whatever else you may, or may not do, in the reading 
of Scott, I say — by all means read Old Mortality ; read 
W^^verley ; read Guy Mannering ; read the Heart of 


196 


ABOUT OLD STORY-TELLERS. 


Mid-Lothian ; read Ivanhoe ; and if you would be in 
weeping mood, and sigh over distresses you cannot 
help, — read the Bride of Lammermoor. 

I have told you that Scott was not for a long time 
known as the author of these tales, — save to a few of 
his most intimate friends ; and the full story of it was 
only noised widely, and to all the world, when his for- 
tune broke down under the weight of Johnny Ballan- 
tyne’s recklessness, and Constables’ (his publishers) 
canny self-seeking, and the costs of that great pile of 
Abbotsford, and of the profitless moorlands he had 
with a strange ambition heaped together about his 
home. 

All this brought age to him, and blight. He strug- 
gled bravely indeed ; he wrote in this time of • breaking 
hopes that charming story of Woodstock. 

But he fought at very hard odds the battle of life, 
after this. Great earnings were small, compared with 
the great debts that shadowed him. 

Death came too, into his new and splendid home : 
Charlotte, his wife, the companion of so many years, 
died. The tragedy of Lammermoor will not touch you 
more than the story of this grief, as he has written it 
down in a few swift, crazy words, in his Diary. 

After this, the wrecked fortune, the loneliness, the 
bitterness, weighed on him more and more. He went 
to Paris, — seeking some facts about the life of Napo- 
leon on which he was working. But the beauty of that 
gay capital could not bring back the old cheer and life 
and hopefulness to this breaking man. He went to Italy, 
the Government placing a ship at his disposal for the 
trip ; but Italy, with its sunny skies, and wealth of art, 


A SCOTCH MAGICIAN. 


197 


could not bring into his veins the old tides of life 
which had run brimfull along Tweedside and Teviot- 
dale. He came back to Abbotsford a wreck. The 
Esk and the Yarrow murmured, as he was borne along 
their banks, just as sweetly as they did fifty years be- 
fore ; but ear and heart and hopes were palsied. 

Sometimes a gleam of the old life seemed to return, 
and he asked for his pens, his ink, and the old seat at 
his table. 

Could he write No, the weak fingers could not 
even grasp the pen. There was a new dog in the place 
of old Maida ; he could pat hinty and he did. He could 
say a kind word to this and that familiar friend ; not 
saying all he would say, and stammering through the 
little he could say. 

At last, in the sunshine on the Tweed banks, — there 
before his doors, — he summons Lockhart, his son-in- 
law, to his side. 

‘‘Will he have Anne (his daughter) called too.?” 

No, she — poor girl — has slept none the night past: 
he will not have her disturbed. 

Lockhart,” he says, “be good — be virtuous; noth- 
ing else will bring you comfort when you come to the 
end.” 

It was the end — for this great Scotchman. A half- 
hour later, and he was wholly still. 

If I had known all these things of him when our old 
master said, “Walter Scott is dead,” — I should have 
felt very differently. 



X. 

ROBINSON CRUSOE. 

Fifty Founds Feward. 

I N England, a great many years ago, — when Anne 
had just become queen, and when the Duke of 
Marlborough was making those dashing marches on the 
Continent of Europe which went before the fearful and 
the famous battle of Blenheim ; and when the people of 
Boston, in New England, were talking about printing 
their first newspaper (but had not yet done it), — there 
appeared in the London Gazette a proclamation, offer- 
ing a reward of fifty pounds for the arrest of a “ middle- 
sized, spare man, about forty years old, of a brown 
complexion, and dark brown-colored hair, who wears a 
wig, and has a hooked nose, a sharp chin, and a large 
mole near his mouth.” And the proclamation further 
said that “he was for many years a hose-factor in Free- 
man’s yard, in Cornhill.” 

And what do you care about this man with a hooked 
nose, for whose capture a reward was offered about the 
year 1703 ? 



ROBINSON CRUSOE. 


199 


Had he plotted to kill the queen ? No. Had he 
forged a note } No. Had he murdered anybody 1 No. 
Was he a Frenchman in disguise } No. 

What then } 

He had written some very sharp political pamphlets, 
which the people in authority didn’t at all like, and were 
determined to punish him for. 



Daniel Oeioe. 


But I suppose there were a great many hot political 
writers who were caught up In the same way in those 
old-fashioned times, and put in the pillory or in prison 
for the very same sort of wrong-doing, whose names we 
don’t know, and don’t care to know. 

Why, then, have I brought up this old proclamation 
about this forty-year-old, hook-nosed man } 


200 


ABOUT OLD STORY-TELLERS. 


Only because his name was Daniel Defoe, and be< 
cause he wrote that most delightful of all the story- 
books that ever were written, — Robinson Crusoe ! 

To be sure, he had not written “ Robinson Crusoe ’’ 
at that time : if he had, perhaps the sheriff, or whoever 
sent out the proclamation, would have described him as 
the writer of a story-book about being cast away on a 
desert island,* and full of monstrous fables, instead of 
describing him as a hosier of Freeman’s Court. But I 
don’t know. People in authority never know or care so 
much about the books a man writes, as about the shop 
he keeps and the debts he owes. 

But did they catch the hook-nosed man ? and did 
somebody get the fifty pounds ? 

Yes, they caught him; and yes, too, — about the 
pounds. 

Poor Defoe had not only to go to prison, but to stand 
in the pillory. Perhaps you do not know what the pil- 
lory was. It was a movable framework of wood, so 
arranged that a criminal was forced to stand in it with 
his head and hands thrust through holes in a plank ; 
and in this condition he was put on show in the public 
streets. It was ah awkward position for a man to be 
placed in ; and when he was disliked by the crowd, he 
ivas pretty sure to have mud thrown at him, and to be 
met by jeers and bootings. What if some of our 
thieves and forgers were to be set up in this way at the 
head of Wall Street ! 

We thank God that we have outlived the times of 
such savage treatment. I wish we could thank God 
that we had outlived the crimes which seem to de- 
serve it. 


ROBINSON CRUSOE. 


201 


But Defoe, in those political writings I spoke of, had 
said no worse things, and no more severe things, than we 
meet with nowadays in our newspapers. Nor was the 
crowd of street people imbittered against him : in fact, 
they brought garlands of flowers, and placed on the pil- 
lory, and threw roses in the street as the officers moved 
him from place to place. 

He had been befriended by King William, who died 
only a short time before; and who — as you know — 
had been brought over from Holland to govern England 
in place of James the Second, who had been driven 
away from the throne. 

Ihe CulpriVs Work. 

What had most brought him into favor with King 
William and his government, was a little pamphlet in 
rhyme which he had written, — called the True-born 
Englishman ; and this had met with great favor too, 
from the people of London. It had been written to 
show that those acted very unwisely who found fault 
with King William for being a foreigner, — and to show 
further that the whole population of England was made 
up by the mingling of different nationalities ; and that 
every man was to be judged by his devotion to the in- 
terests of Britain, and not by his race or birth. This 
would very naturally be well relished by a great city 
population, which had come from all quarters. No book 
— it was only a small pamphlet, to be sure — had met 
with so large a sale for years and years. Hence, I 
think, came those flowers which were hung upon the 
pillory where Daniel Defoe was set up in 1703, 


202 


ABOUT OLD STORY-TELLERS. 


He had written other things as well, which had made 
him well known ; — among the rest a satire in rhyme 
called, “ Advice to the Ladies : Showing that as the 
World goes, and is like to go, the best way is for them 
to keep Unmarried.” 

You would think this a strange way to make himself 
popular. But he says in the preface to this, — “You 
will say ’tis a great fault to persuade People against 
Marriage. I answer, ‘ That to the utmost of my power 
I will ever expose those Infamous, Impertinent, Cow- 
ardly, Censorious, Sauntering, Idle Wretches, called 
Wits and Beaux, the Plague of the Nation, and the 
Scandal of Mankind. But if Lesbia is sure she has 
found a Man of Honor, Religion and Virtue, I will 
never forbid the Banns : let her love him as much as 
she pleases, and value him as an Angel, and be married 
to-morrow if she will.’ ” 

Now, as every young woman thinks she has found the 
Angel, when it comes to the fact of marriage, I think 
other flowers would have been given to Defoe on this 
score. 

But, nevertheless, he had the prison before him ; and 
he tells us he had an awful time there, and chafed hor- 
ribly. He was one of those restless, impatient busy- 
bodies, who want always to be at work, and at work ir 
their own way. He did, in fact, edit a “ Review ” while 
he was in prison, — and procured the printing of it, — • 
in which there was a great deal of sharp talk. 

He was what would have been called in our time, I 
dare say, a hot-headed radical ; and if he had been born 
a century and a half later, would have made a capital 
editorial writer for a slashing morning journal, in either 


ROBINSON CRUSOE. 


203 


New York or Washington. But our people in authority 
would never have offered a reward for his arrest : they 
would have shrugged their shoulders ; or, perhaps, have 
given him an office. 

Yet, for all his political sharpness, this hook-nosed 
man had a head for business, — or, at least, for projects 
of business. Some four years before the prison experi- 
ence, he had published an “ Essay on Projects,” which 
was full of excellent suggestions, but in advance of his 
time. Dr. Franklin relates, that he fell in with a copy 
of this book in his father’s library, when a young man, 
and that he gained ideas from it, which had great influ- 
ence with him in after-life. 

The business project into which Detoe did really 
enter was the establishment of tile-works at Tilbury — 
where were made first in England those queer-shaped 
tiles for roofing, which — if you ever go there — you 
will see on a great many of the houses of Rotterdam 
and Amsterdam ; and some of them are to be found yet 
upon old houses in some of our southern seaboard 
cities. 

A few years ago — in i860 — the workmen upon a 
new railway cutting dug through the meadow where 
these tile-works of Defoe had stood ; and they turned 
up a great many broken tiles, and some curiously-shaped 
tobacco-pipes. And it happened that some visitor, who 
knew the history of the place, told these workmen that 
the tiles they were turning up had been made by the 
writer of Robinson Crusoe : straightway there was a 
rush to gather the best fragments — most of all the 
pipes. They had read the book. 

I think I should have liked myself to lay hold of one 


204 ABOUT OLD STORY-TELLERS. 

of those pipes, and compare it with one which Robinson 
contrived, and rejoiced over in his cavern, — though “it 
was a clumsy thing, and only burnt red like other 
earthern-ware.” 

But the prison life made an end of the pottery works. 
He could write in Newgate, and did ; but he could not 
superintend the tile-yard. 

There were good friends of his who meanwhile were 
bestirring themselves to loose poor Defoe from his 
prison life. Though he was doing more work there 
than most men were doing outside; .yet the narrow 
bounds of the prison-yard, and the bad air, and the con- 
tact with all sorts of wretched criminals, were wearing 
upon his health and strength ; so that when at last a 
messenger came to him from one high in power — asking 
what could be done for him ; he says that he took his 
pen, and wrote the reply of the blind man in the Gospel, 
“Lord, dost thou see that I am blind, and yet ask 
what thou shalt do for me ? My answer is plain in my 
misery, — Lord, that I may receive my sight.” 

This meant liberty ; and he was given his liberty a 
short time afterward. 


Ms Family. 

I have told you he was the author of that book you 
all know so well ; but because he wrote that book 
you must needs want to know who was his father, and 
what he did, and if he had a wife or children. 

Well, his father was not a man who could put his son 
into relations with people in high place, — as Sir Wil- 
liam Temple did for Jonathan Swift, — not far from the 
same time. 


ROBINSON CRUSOE. 


205 


Defoe’s father was a butcher — named James Foe — 
in the parish of St. Giles, in the city of London, — where 
Daniel was born. How his father’s simple name of 
Foe grew into Defoe, is something that I am afraid 
could not be explained without saying that our good 
friend Daniel had the vanity to think that the long name 
sounded better than the short one ; — which is after all, 
no worse a vanity than that of our lady friend, who 
thinks a long ribbon to her hat is more becoming than 
a short one. 

Not that Defoe was ashamed of his parentage : no, 
no, — ten times over. Always, when he speaks of his 
father, it is with respect and love. And there is noth- 
ing to show that he did not deserve it. He certainly 
sent him to a good school, and would have given him 
a training to be a clergyman ; this was not to Daniel’s 
taste, so he became a hosier, and then — failing in that 
— went into tile-making (as we have seen), to which 
the prison brought an end. 

A British admirer says that his grandfather, Daniel 
Foe, ‘‘kept hounds ” in Northamptonshire, — as if keep- 
ing hounds to kill foxes (for sport) were a great deal 
better than keeping sharp knives to kill lambs (for 
food). Perhaps so ; at least it is one of those social 
puzzles with which the Daniel Defoe who wrote the 
True-born Englishman did not concern himself greatly. 
Hear what he says, in what is very bad poetry cer- 
tainly : — 

“ Then let us boast of Ancestors no more, 

Or Deeds of Heroes done in days of yore ; 

For Fame of Families is all a cheat: 

’Tis Personal Virtue only makes us great.” 


206 


ABOUT OLD STORY-TELLERS. 


But perhaps he wrote in this way because he could 
make no boast himself. It is poorly worth while to in- 
quire. When we find a man writing common sense, 
the presumption ought to be that he writes thus because 
it is common sense. 

Did the author of Robinson Crusoe have a wife and 
children } Oh, yes ! — there were some six children, 
and a wife, to whom Queen Anne sent a gift of a hun- 
dred pounds — the while her husband was in prison. 
Defoe slipped out of London the moment he was set 
free from Newgate, — to go down and meet that wife 
and those children, who were living just then in the 
old town of Bury-St. -Edmunds. 

[The name of that town sounds familiar : did you 
ever hear it before ? Have you ever read Pickwick ? 
Didn’t Mr. Pickwick take a coach-ride in that direction 
once ? And was there not an Angel Inn ? and a man 
in a mulberry suit ?] 

He did not go back into trade, — either hosiery or 
tile-making ; perhaps he saw his unfitness for it. There 
is something in a book he wrote called The Complete 
Tradesman,” which looks like it. 

“A wit turned Tradesman ! ” he says : “what an in- 
congruous part of Nature is thus brought together ! No 
apron-strings will hold him ; ’tis in vain to lock him in 
behind the counter, he’s gone in a moment ; instead of 
journal and ledger, he runs away to his Virgil and 
Horace.” 

But you must not believe he was very poor : some of 
the people about Queen Anne found out that he was a 
most serviceable writer ; and he was sent down to Scot- 
land, under pay, to help forward some designs of the 


ROBINSON CRUSOE, 


207 


government The Scotch did not like him, for they did 
not like the business he was sent upon ; and though he 
wrote a poem on Caledonia to put them in good humor, 
it did not succeed. 

His pen was all the while busy however, but mostly 
with political matter, which passed out of sight with the 
occasion that called it up. There was though an ac- 
count of the apparition of Mrs. Veal (after death, and in 



House where “Robinson Crusoe" was written. 


a scoured silk gown) to one Mistress Bargrave, which 
set all the street world of London agog. It was so 
wonderfully told ! — so well told, people thought Mrs. 
Veal must have come to life ; and crowds went hunting 
after Mrs. Bargrave to hear if it were really so. 

Fifteen years or more after he went out of prison, 
down to Bury-St.-Edmunds, we hear of him as living in a 


2o8 


ABOUT OLD STORY-TELLERS. 


big house which he had built at Stoke-Newington with a 
coach-house attached. This meant — as it does not 
always mean now — that he had money. There were 
some five acres of pleasure ground attached, where he 
pleased himself with working at gardening. 

He had certainly three daughters living with him 
there, besides his wife Susannah. And his daughters 
were quick-witted, winning girls ; Sophia being the 
most so : she married, ten years later, a Mr. Baker, who 
is authority for this account of them all. 

And in this big, square, uncomely house, — of which 
I show you a picture, — was written in the year 1718 
by this hook-nosed man — then well on toward sixty 
years of age — “ The Life and Strange Surprising Ad- 
ventures of Robinson Crusoe, of York, Mariner, who 
lived Eight-and-Twenty Years, all alone, in an Unin- 
habited Island on the Coast of America, near the mouth 
of the great River Oroonoque.” 

the Book. 

Ah, what a book it was ! what a book it is ! 

You do not even know the names of those political 
pamphlets which this man wrote, and which made him a 
friend of the great King William, and gave him fame ; 
nor do you know the names of those others which 
brought him to prison ; nor do you know the names of 
those later ones which made Queen Anne befriend him, 
and kept her his friend until the queen died ; nor do 
you know — nor do your fathers or mothers know much 
about those other books which this man wrote upon 
Trade, and Religious Courtship, and a score of other 



Robinson Crusoe, 




ROBINSON CRUSOE, 


21 


things ; nor are they by anybody much read or called 
for. But as for that dear old figure — in the high goat- 
skin cap, — and with the umbrella to match, — and the 
long beard, — who does not know him, and all about 
him, all over the Christian world } 

Why, long as it is since I first trembled over the sight 
of those savage footmarks in the sand, and slept in the 
cave, and pulled up the rope-ladder that hung down over 
the palisades, — yet, if that dear old Robinson in his 
tall cap and his goat-skin leggings were to march up 
my walk on some mild spring evening, I don’t think 
I should treat him as a stranger in the least. I think I 
should go straight to him, and clap him on the back, and 
say, — 

“ My dear Mr. Crusoe, I’m ever so glad to see you ! 

“ And did Friday come with you } 

“ And is Poll at the station } 

“ And have you been to York } 

“ And do you think of going to sea again } ” 

I don’t know any figure of the last two centuries that 
it would be so hard to blot out of men’s minds as the 
figure of Robinson Crusoe. 

How came this hook-nosed man to write it } 

Well — Queen Anne was dead : this had thrown him 
somewhat off his track. Then, the people about George 
I. who had just come to the throne did not much favor 
Mr. Defoe ; perhaps they were afraid of him ; perhaps 
they thought him gone by, and useless. Perhaps Han- 
over George had too many friends of his own. 

But what suggested such a subject ? Was there really 
a Mr. Robinson whose father lived down at Hull ? 

No : but there had lived a man named Selkirk, — • 


212 


ABOUT OLD STORY-TELLERS. 


Alexander Selkirk, — in Fife, Scotland, who went mate 
on a trading-voyage with Capt. Stradling, in a ship called 
the Cinque Ports, 

Off the island of Juan Fernandez, which is abreast 
of Chili on the South American coast, Selkirk fell into a 
quarrel with his captain ; and, being a high-strung young 
fellow, he said he would rather be put ashore than to 
sail with the captain farther. 

So the captain put him ashore — with only his bed- 
ding, a gun, and a very few such useful things. He 
staid alone on that island four years and four months 
before a British ship touched there by accident, and 
brought him off. He was in goat-skin clothes, and had 
his last shirt on when Capt. Dover took him off. 

This much was all true as gospel, and was printed in 
Woodes Rogers’s account of his voyage in 1712 (being 
seven years before Robinson Crusoe was printed) : the 
whole story of Woodes Rogers would have filled about 
one column of a newspaper. 

Some jealous people said Defoe stole his story of 
Robinson Crusoe from it. 

But a man can’t steal a silver dinner-service out of a 
pewter plate. 

He used the incidents without question, — as any one 
else might have done — but didn’t. Ten shipwrecked 
men might tell their stories to you or me, and yet no 
Robinson Crusoe come of it. 

There are plenty of good incidents all abroad ; it is 
the art which builds upon them that is rare, and which, 
in place of a jumble of words that will set the facts 
only before you, will twist out of them a drama that 
kindles your passions and your love, and dwells^ with 


ROBINSON CRUSOE. 


213 


you as a tender memory forever. And all this is done 

— not by fine words and long words, and by what 
young people are apt to call — splendid writing. This 
“ splendid ” writing is indeed a very bad thing to aim 
at, and the very last thing to admire. I wish all school- 
masters thought so ; but unfortunately they do not. 

How could any thing be more homely and modest 
and straightforward than the language which Defoe 
uses to tell the adventures of Robinson.? Yet no words 
could be better for the purpose he had in mind ; — and 
that was — to make everybody feel that the things told 
of did really and truly happen. 

There were critics, to be sure, who, in the day of its 
first printing, thought it was “ carelessly written," and 
that there was a great deal which was very “ improba- 
ble " in it ; and they didn’t imagine for a moment that 
there was the stuff in it which would be pondered, and 
read over and over, and admired and dearly cherished 

— years and years after they and all their fair culture 
and fine words and very names should be forgotten. 

I don’t at all believe that Defoe himself knew how 
good a thing he had done. If he had, he wouldn’t have 
gone about to weaken its effect by writing a sequel to 
Robinson ; which, though it has some curious and won- 
derful things in it, is yet hardly worth your reading. 
And not content with this, Defoe — under the spur, I 
suppose, of money-making publishers, — wrote, the next 
year, “ Serious Reflections during the life of Robinson 
Crusoe, with his Vision of the Angelic World.’’ 

Nobody knows it or reads it. Poll and Man Friday 
are all alive ; but the Vision of the Angelic World is 
utterly dead. 


214 


ABCUT OLD STORY-TELLERS. 


Defoe also published shortly afterward the History of 
the Life and Adventures of Mr. Duncan Campbell ; and 
in the same year Memoirs of a Cavalier. This last, 
however, was understood to be based upon a manuscript 
written by another hand. The following year there 
appeared by Defoe “ The Life, Adventures, and Piracies 
of the famous Captain Singleton.” But I cannot tell 
you, nor would you care to know, the names of all that 
he wrote. The titles alone, if I were to write them out 
in full, would fill a hundred pages as large as this. 

His Religious Courtship may entertain you if you 
happen to be of age for thinking on such a subject ; 
and his Complete Tradesman has a great many capital 
suggestions in it, — full of the pith which belonged to 
Poor Richard’s maxims. 

He wrote also a long history of the Great Plague in 
London, which is so dreadfully real that it would make 
you shudder to read it. You seem to see all the sick 
people, and the dead ones with their livid faces ; and the 
wagons that bore the corpses go trundling every morn- 
ing down the street. You would wonder, if you read it, 
how old man Defoe could have gone about prying 
amongst such fearful scenes, as if he loved grief and 
wailing and desolation ; for he don’t tell you that he 
helped anybody, or even lifted the dead into the carts. 
How could he } He wasn’t there at all. The Great 
Plague raged and ended before Defoe was grown. He 
may have heard old men and old women talk of it ; but 
he couldn’t have been more than two years old when it 
first broke out. 


ROBINSON CRUSOE. 


215 


Good-by, Robinson! 

But I will close this half-hour’s talk with only dear 
old Robinson Crusoe in our mind. Defoe wrote of him, 
as I said, when he was well toward sixty ; and he lived 
to be over seventy, — having a great grief to bear at the 
last. His son deserted and deceived hhn as Robinson 
Crusoe had deserted and deceived his old father at 
York! 

“This injustice and unkindness,” writes Defoe to a 
near friend in the last year of his life, “ has ruined my 
family, and has broken my heart. I depended on him, I 
trusted him, I gave up my two dear unprovided children 
into his hands ; but he had no compassion, and suffered 
them and their poor dying mother to beg their bread at 
his door ; himself, at the same time, living in a profu- 
sion of plenty. ’ It is too much for me. My heart is 
too full. Stand by them when I am gone, and let them 
not be wronged.” 

This is a true letter of Defoe’s, and one of the last 
which he ever wrote ; but the old man was sadly broken 
in the latter years of his life, and looked too despairingly 
upon his home affairs : it is certain that his wife did 
not beg her bread, nor was she at that time in a dying 
condition. But I suspect there was only too good 
ground for his shaken confidence in the son ; and I 
fear the poor old gentleman died without forgiving him, 
and without being asked to forgive. 

He lies buried in Bunhill Fields — where Bunyan lies 
buried too. The epitaph which would commemorate 
him best would be one which should say simply, “ He 


2I6 


ABOUT OLD STORY-TELLERS. 


wrote the story of Robinson Crusoe.” And methinks 
a figure of the dear old adventurer in his goat-skin 
clothes, and his goat-skin cap, might well stand upon 
his grave. 



Saving Traps from the Wreck. 


Who would not know it? Who has not read the 
book .? How could people help reading it ? How could 
they help being terribly concerned about the fate of 


ROBINSON CRUSOE. 


217 


that madcap, who would leave that sober old father of 
his in Hull, and that mother who cried over his fate, 
you may be sure, more than ever you or I ? Who could 
help reading on, when he escaped so hardly from wreck 
and death, on the shores of England, near to Yarmouth ; 
and fell in with such bad fellows in London ; and hesi- 
tated, and wavered, and finally broke into new vaga- 
bondage ; and was followed up by storms and wreck, 
and at last, as you know, cast ashore with scarce life in 
him, on that far-away island, where he bewailed his fate 
for months and years, and toiled hard, and tamed his 
goats, and planted his palisades? 

A great many thousand eyes looked out with him, 
year after year, for the sail that never came. Of course 
there had been a great many stories of adventures writ- 
ten before, and there have been a great many since ; 
but never, I think, any that took such hold of the feel- 
ings of all, as this story. 

Why, do you know that crowds of people believed in 
Robinson Crusoe when Defoe was living, and continued 
to believe in him after Defoe was dead ? I know I be- 
lieved in him a long time myself ; though the preface, 
and the sober-sided old school-ma’am (who caught me 
one day at the reading of it in school-hours, and made 
me wear a girl’s bonnet for punishment), — though such 
as these, I say, warned me that it was a fable and 
untrue, yet I kept on, somehow, believing in Robin- 
son, and in Poll, and Man Friday ; and thought, if I 
ever did make a long voyage, and the ship had a yawl, 
I would ask the captain, when he came opposite the 
island, to “heave to,” and let me go ashore in the yawl, 
and find the cave and the creek, and very likely the 


2i8 


ABOUT OLD STORY-TELLERS. 


remnants of that big canoe in the forest, which Robin- 
son Crusoe hewed from so huge a log — that he never 
could and never did move it. 



Robinson at Home. 


I believed in that old deserted father, down in York- 
shire : — somehow, I think he is living there yet, — 
repining, grieving, praying, weeping ! 

Oh, Robinson, Robinson ! 



XL 

HOW A TINKER WROTE A NOVEL. 
Travels of Christian. 

O NCE upon a time — years and years ago — I 
wanted some good Sunday book to read ; and 
when the want was made known, I was helped to a big, 
leather-bound, octavo book, which at first glance— -not- 
withstanding one or two large splotches of gilt upon the 
back — did not look inviting. In the first place, what 
boy wants to grapple with a big octavo } Your precious 
old aunt will tell you what an octavo is, — that it means 
a book with its paper folded so as to make eight leaves 
of every sheet, whereas a duodecimo is one of paper 
folded so as to make twelve leaves to a sheet ; and this 
last is therefore much handier and every way better for 
boy use, — at least, I think so. Then it was bound in 
full calf — very suspiciously like a dictionary, and like — 
well, I must say it — like the Bible. I don’t mean, of 
course, to breathe one word against that venerable vol- 
ume ; but then, you know, when a fellow wants a good 
Sunday book, and knows just where the Bible is kept, 

219 


220 


ABOUT OLD STORY-TELLERS. 


and has read it ever so often, he doesn’t want what 
looks too much like it. 

However, there I was with the big book on my knee ; 
and there were pictures in it. These were stunning. 
There was a picture of a man with a great pack on his 
back, doing his best to get out of a huge bog ; and 
there were some people standing by, who didn’t seem 
to help him much. 

There was a picture of a prodigious giant, — fully as 
large as that in Jack and the Beanstalk story, — who 
was leading off two little men, — one of whom looked 
like the man that wore the big pack, and was near sink- 
ing in the bog. Then there was a splendid picture of 
this same little man walking up with all the pluck in 
the world, through a path, beside which were seated 
two old giants, who — judging from the bones which 
lay scattered around their seats — seemed to have been 
amusing themselves by eating up just such little men as 
the plucky one, who came marching up between them 
so bravely. 

In short, the pictures carried the day ; and though it 
seemed droll Sunday work, I wanted amazingly to find 
out how this plucky little man got through with his bogs 
and giants. 

So I set to. 

Christian was the man’s name, and he had a family. 
But he became pretty well satisfied that he was living in 
a city that would certainly be destroyed ; and was very 
much troubled about it, and couldn’t sleep at night, nor 
let his family sleep. 

So it happened that this Christian, after getting some 
directions from a man called Evangelist, “put out ” one 


NOIV A TINKER WROTE A NOVEL. 


221 


day, with his pack upon his back, and left his wife and 
children. 

They did indeed run out after him so soon as they 
saw that he was fairly set off, and called to him very 
piteously and loudly, — which is not surprising, if he 
was a man of fair honesty ; but he — strangely enough, 
I think — put his fingers in his ears, and cried out, — 
“ Life, life ! ” I didn’t, in fact, at all like the manner 
in which the book makes him leave his family behind 
him. His course may have been well enough ; but why 
shouldn’t he have taken them along with him, instead 
of leaving his children to be looked after by that fellow 
Great-Hear — But I mustn’t tell the story in advance. 

His going off in this way made a great deal of noise 
in the neighborhood ; and a Mr. Pliable, who was some- 
thing of a gossip, went out crossways to meet Christian, 
and have a chat with him, and was won over to keep 
by him, until they both tumbled into that great bog I 
spoke of. After floundering in this for a while, — Plia- 
ble abusing Christian for getting him in such a scrape, 
— they both crawled out. Pliable struck back, straight 
for home. 

Christian kept on, — very wearily, with all that mire 
upon him in addition to his pack. A Mr. Worldly-Wise- 
man met him on the road. He was a pompous man, 
and had the air of knowing all that it was needful for 
anybody to know, and of having a well-filled purse 
besides. 

When he heard that Christian was travelling to the 
Celestial City, he said, Pooh, nonsense ! ” and advised 
him to go across to the town of Morality, where he 
himself had a snug house, which he sometimes occtr 


222 


ABOUT OLD STORY-TELLERS. 


pied. My impression is that he offered to rent it to 
him at a low rate. He told Christian, moreover, that 
Squire Legality, who lived there also, would take off 
his pack for him, — which, unlike most travellers, he 
was very anxious to be rid of : indeed, if he had valued 
it very highly, I think Mr. Legality would have taken it 
off all the same — if he had fallen in his way. 

Christian does make a side-start on the Morality-road ; 
but Evangelist sees him before he has gone far, and 
puts him into the path he first chose. This takes him 
through a wicket, — where the keeper is very kind, — 
and brings him after a while to a place called the Inter- 
preter’s house, where he sees many wonderful things, — 
in visions, as it were. Among the rest, two boys named 
Patience and Passion, whom I haven’t forgotten to this 
day. Patience took things very quietly, and had a good, 
honest, contented look ; — while Passion, with heaps of 
money, dashed it all abroad in a very reckless way. 

He sees, too, here, — or thinks he sees (though it is 
hard to tell which of the two it is), a man shut up in a 
cage of despair, and who has a very sad time of it, beat- 
ing against the bars of his den. 

There was a house called Beautiful on his way, where 
he was received by two excellent persons, — Discretion 
and Charity. They took Christian to task, however, for 
having set off without his wife and family ; and his ex- 
cuses were not of the best, I thought. However, they 
treated him well, and had him up in the morning to the 
top of the house, from which they pointed out to him 
the Delectable Mountains, that lay straight in his path. 
There couldn’t be a finer country than that seemed to 
be, or than that proved to be, when he reached it at 


NOtV A TINKER WROTE A NOVEL. 22$ 

last I don’t think there was any thing in the book 
more enjoyable than that stoppage in the Delectable 
country ; the very thought of it for years after brought 
up the loveliest images of fountains and sweetly-flowing 
streams, and vineyards, and the most luscious of fruits. 



Passion and Patience. 


I wondered why Christian did not stop there altogether. 
But it seemed to be a road whereon every one must 
travel — when once they had set foot upon it, — either 
in a wrong direction or a right one. 

Vanity Fair was an extraordinary place he had to pass 


'12\ A^OUT OLD STORY-TELLERS. 

through, with a sort of world’s exhibition always going 
on in it, — with a French Row, and an Italian Row, and 
a British Row : I am sure there would have been an 
American Row if the author had known as much of our 
people as of the rest of Vanity Fair. 

As for the city, it was not very unlike New York : 
the judges were worse, I think; and Faithful, — who 
was the best of men (at least, he seemed so), gets exe- 
cuted there. 

Christian made good speed out of it — so soon as he 
could. 

I can’t undertake to give the full order of his travel ; 
but I know he met a great monster, Apollyon, some- 
where, a prodigious creature with scales, equal to any 
thing in the Arabian Nights. He strode wide across 
the way on which Christian was making his pilgrimage, 
and gave fight to him. My heart stood in my mouth at 
the first reading of this battle. Would Christian win } 
It was “ nip and tuck ” with them for a long time, and 
I was not sure how it could come out. But at last Chris- 
tian gave this Apollyon a good punch under the fifth 
rib, and the dragon flew away 

There was a Giant Despair somewhere, who lived in 
Doubting Castle, in sight froth the road. Christian was 
warned against him (I think he was in company with 
poor Faithful at this time), and they somehow strayed 
into his territory, and fell asleep. 

This made one’s heart beat. What if the giant should 
take a walk in their direction ! 

Why don’t they wake up } — we thought. But they 
slept, and slept. And the giant did come that way, and 
haled them into his underground dungeons. I think I 
gave Christian up at this pass. 


//Otv A TINKER WROTE A NOEEL. 


225 


This giant had a wife called Diffidence, — which 
seemed a very funny name for a woman who advised 
the giant — after they had gone to bed — to give Chris- 
tian and Faithful a good sound beating every morning 
after breakfast. 

He did give them a beating, and a good many of 
them ; and Christian would have been murdered out- 
right if he had not bethought himself of a key he had 

— all the while — in his own bosom, and which would 
unlock any door in all Doubting Castle. 

It was very stupid in him not to have thought of the 
key before ; but he didn’t. 

However, he used it at last, — unlocked the dungeon 
door, — helped up poor Faithful, — went along the stairs 

— very quietly, — tried another lock, — opened that 
(what if the giant should hear !), and it grated fearfully ; 
unlocked another and another, and at last they were safe 
outside once more, and made their way back to the true 
path which they had wandered from. They set up a 
column of some sort thereabout, — so that other people 
shouldn’t get into the grounds of Doubting Castle again 
for want of warning. This was very good of them ; but 
I suspect it did not serve much purpose. Almost every- 
body stops to see Doubting Castle, and take the risk of 
being caught by Giant Despair. 

Well, this plucky, earnest Christian went on, — meet- 
ing with hobgoblins, — worrying terribly in a certain Val- 
ley of Humiliation, — trembling as he walked between 
two great monsters called Pope and Pagan (he was fool- 
ish for that, — since these giants had their teeth drawn, 
or had worn off the sharp edges of them with long years 
of mumbling). 


226 


ABOUT OLD STORY-TELLERS. 


He enjoys himself hugely in the Delectable Moun- 
tains — (I was sure he would), and the hospitable 
shepherds entertain him very kindly : he reaches the 



Escape from Doubting Castle. 


worst in the valley of the waters of Death, but comes 
out all right at last by the shores of the river of Life, 
and passes on into the streets of the Celestial City. 


I/OJV A TINKER WROTE A NOEEL. 22 / 


Greal-Eeari. 

Don’t forget that it was a Sunday on which I first 
read this book, and dreamed after it — of Apollyon 
(whom I imagined a monster bat, with wings ten feet 
long, and flapping them with a horrible, flesh-y sound) 
— also, of Giant Despair and his deep dungeon. {If 
Christian had happened to forget the key !) 

I don’t think I dreamed of old Worldly-Wiseman, or 
Pliable, or Legality, or Pick-thank. These are humble, 
riff-raff characters (to boys), compared with Apollyon. 
But the day will come when grown boys will reckon 
them worse monsters than even Apollyon, — by a great 
deal. I know I do. 

There was a second part to this story, — though both 
parts were bound in one within the leather covers I told 
you of. It was too much together for one day’s read- 
ing ; but I came to it all afterward. 

The second part tells the story of Christian’s wife 
and children. The good woman bewailed her husband, 
and bethought herself sorrily if she had been always to 
him what she should have been. She didn’t for a 
moment accuse him for not taking her with him ; it 
appears now indeed — as if the author of the book had 
thought better of it — that poor Christian did urge and 
urge, over and over, that wife and children should to- 
gether set off ; and that he did not put his fingers in his 
ears in that selfish way until all hope seemed gone. 

Of course it had made much stir in their town, that 
Christian should have gone off in that manner ; and 
there were all kinds of rumors as to what had happened 


228 


ABOUT OLD STORY-TELLERS. 


to him, and many reports of his adventures ; there were 
those even who undertook to say where he actually was 
at present, and what sort of robes he was wearing, &c. 
As if they knew ! 

But Christiana — that was the name of Christian’s 
wife — did not cease to vex herself; and after much 
thinking, determined to set off on the same journey her 
good husband (she thought him good now that he was 
gone) had taken the year (it may have been two years) 
before. 

When the packing began, and the news spread, you 
may be sure there was a new stir in the town : the 
gossips had a great feast in talking of it ; and many of 
them came to reason with Christiana, — and to see what 
wardrobe she might be carrying ; and to bid her an 
affectionate good-by, and see what hat she might be 
wearing on the journey. 

One charming young person, whose name was Mercy, 
and who was no gossip at all, and never knew how 
many flounces anybody wore to their skirts, or what 
they cost, — determined to go with Christiana. Chris- 
tiana could not have had a better companion. 

So they set off — children and all — this time. The 
Slough of Despond (being the bog spoken of) was still 
there, and in bad condition. The king of that country 
had indeed given orders to mend this slough ; and it 
was said thousands of loads of waste material had been 
dumped there, — for which the bills had been paid, — 
still there was no sign of mending, and it continued as 
grievous and plaguing as if it had been a highway of a 
New-England town with the regularly elected select- 
men puttering around it. 


//OM^ A TINKER WROTE A NOVEL. 229 

But Mercy guides them through safely ; and they go 
in high spirits through the first wicket, and reach in 
good time the Interpreter’s house. 

They see many things here — by reason, I suppose, of 
there being women of the party — which even Christian 
did not see ; amongst others, — a man raking everlast- 
ingly in a muck-heap, and never looking up. He was 
said to be a kind of stock-broker. 

Great-Heart, the real hero of this second journey, 
takes them in charge to go on to the House Beautiful, 
and wards off a great many dangers from them on the 
way, — putting to death on the road a stout man by the 
name of Grim, who gave a great fright to Christiana’s 
boys. Indeed, he showed such valor that the women 
entreated — Mercy especially — that he should keep 
by them altogether. He seems to have done so ; at 
least, he was always near when there was any fighting 
to be done. 

There was a dapper little lawyer called Brisk, who in- 
troduced himself to the party at the House Beautiful, — 
he being a temporary boarder like themselves. He was 
a fine-spoken man, though a little airy. He greatly ad- 
mired Mercy’s housekeeping ways with her needle. He 
asks her how much she could earn at it ? 

Aha, Lawyer Brisk ! But she wouldn’t listen to his 
love-making ; and I was very glad when she said “ No ” 
to him. 

If, indeed, it had been Great-Heart ! 

One of Christiana’s boys fell sick hereabouts with 
gripes, — from eating apples that fell from over the wall 
of Beelzebub’s garden (I dare say Matthew shook them 
off himself). He is so poorly that they call in a Doctor 


230 


ABOUT OLD STORY-TELLERS. 


Skill, who has a large practice, and puts up pills which 
give the go-by very quickly to Beelzebub’s apples. 

As they go on, Great-Heart kindly shows the boys 
where their father Christian fought with Apollyon ; and 
he warns them all in the Valley of Humiliation to keep 
close by him. And it was extraordinary how the phan- 
toms and monsters that threatened and growled, van- 
ished when Great-Heart marched straight upon them 
without blinking. Lions, for instance, whose great feet 
the boys can hear pattering up over the grass after them 
in the dark, — when once they stand and face them, 
with Great-Heart close by, — turn, and are heard no 
more. 

It’s not so, however, with giant Maul : the fight with 
him was one of the hardest in the book. What a pic- 
ture there was of it ! I would have liked to show you 
a copy of it ; but the printers who control these things 
say such pictures cost immensely, and wouldn’t hear 
of it. 

This Maul has a huge club,, which he brandishes, and 
fetches Great-Heart a blow with it that brings that 
brave man to his knee. Mercy screamed, and thought 
it had been all up with him ; and so indeed did I, — at 
the first reading. But he gets upon his legs, and, after 
long parrying, gives Maul a thrust between his ribs that 
makes an end of him, and puts the boys and poor trem- 
bling Christiana in good case once more. 

I forget now where, — but at one point they came up 
with old Honesty, — one of the very best fellows in all 
the book. It is so refreshing to meet with a new char- 
acter ! The only thing I disliked about him was his 
putting in a favoring word when somebody hinted that 


HOW A TINKER WROTE A NOVEL. 


231 


Mercy should marry Matthew, — the boy who was made 
sick with eating Beelzebub’s apples. I never liked this. 
She was too fine a woman. Yet such young fellows 
somehow always get the fine women, and don’t get — 
over eating Beelzebub’s apples. 

When the party came up to the stile that led over into 
the grounds of Doubting Castle, Great-Heart proposed 
to go over and call out giant Despair, and make an end 
of him. 

At this point I remember my heart beat pit-a-pat again. 
Would he do it ? Would the giant come out ? Would 
Great-Heart have the better of him } What if the giant 
should throw a rock out of the windows upon him } 
Then there were nets in those grounds, and pitfalls ; 
and Mrs. Diffidence with her hot water and spits. 

However, Great-Heart did go ; and did call him out ; 
and did slay giant Despair, — as much as such a char- 
acter can be slain. T/ia^ Doubting Castle was pulled 
down then and there ; but there has been a new one 
built, with modern improvements. The gentlemen who 
occupy it — philosophers among them — don’t waylay 
strangers in the old manner : in fact, they give them 
strong, juicy meats to eat, and set them on the road 
again, in high spirits, — back to the town of Morality. 
There have been stories, however, that some of the 
younger dwellers in Doubting Castle, have, in a fit of 
passion, brained an innocent visitor or two, with some 
of the old bones lying about the premises. 

They push on after this without very great adven- 
tures. They have a nice time at those dear Delectable 
Mountains, and through a spy-glass catch a glimpse of 
the Celestial City. Some think they see it, and some 
think they don’t. 


232 


ABOUT OLD STORY-TELLERS. 


They don’t mind the dangers of the Enchanted 
Ground much. Mistress Bubble with her fawning and 
fine jewels, and offer of soirees (I presume she gave 
amateur theatric shows), did not wheedle them at all. 

They came to Beulah at last, and to the river brink, — 
and sang as they looked, — 

“ Sweet fields beyond the swelling flood 
Stand dressed in living green.” 

Ah, but that Great-Heart was a noble fellow ! Mercy 
ought to have married him; but it didn’t end so. Great- 
Heart never married. 

Well, that story in the leathern covers, and as big as 
a Bible, has been printed by hundreds of thousands, and 
has been translated into all the languages of Europe. 
And it was written by a travelling tinker. Think of 
that ! 

John Bunyan. 

John Bunyan was his name ; and he was born in a 
house built of timber and clay (which was standing not 
many years ago), in the little village of Elstow, near to 
Bedford, England. 

Bedfordshire is a beautiful county : there are fine 
farms and great houses, and beautiful parks in it ; but 
this man, John Bunyan, was the son of a travelling 
tinker, and was born there only a few years after the 
pilgrims landed from the Mayflower on Plymouth Rock. 
He says of himself that he was a wild lad, swearing 
dreadfully, going about with his father to tinker broken 
tea-pots, lying under hedges, having narrow escapes 
from death — once, falling into the river Ouse, and 


HOIV A TINKER WROTE A NOVEL. 233 

another time handling an adder, and pulling out his 
fangs with his fingers. 

But he fell in with Puritan preachers, who “ waked 
his conscience ; ” for he lived just in the heart of those 
times which are described in Walter Scott’s novel of 
“Woodstock,” and in that other novel of “ Peveril of 



the Peak ; ” and^he didn’t think much of episcopacy or 
bishops ; and at last he took to preaching himself, — 
having left off all his evil courses. 

He married too, and had four children, — one of them, 
poor Mary Bunyan, blind from her birth. Bunyan loved 
this girl greatly. I think when he wrote of Mercy, — 
he thought of Mary Bunyan. 


234 


ABOUT OLD STORY-TELLERS, 


He fought in the civil wars under Cromwell, and it is 
possible enough that he may have seen Charles the 
First go out to execution. Maybe he was one of those 
crazy fellows who came to Ditchley (in Scott’s novel) 
to help capture the runaway, Charles the Second, who 
was gallivanting in that time in the household of old 
Sir Arthur Lee. He throve while the Commonwealth 


Bedford Jail. 



lasted ; but when Charles the Second was called back 
to the throne in 1660 (John Bunyan being then thirty- 
two years old), it was a hard time for Puritans, and 
worst of all for such Puritan of Puritans as the Puritan 
preacher, — Bunyan. 

They tried him for holding disorderly religious meet- 
ings ; and he put a brave^ face on it, and contested his 


HOW A TINKER WROTE A NOVEL. 235 


right ; but this only made the matter worse for him, and 
they condemned him to perpetual banishment. Some- 
how, this judgment was changed in such a way, that 
Bunyan, in place of being shipped to Holland or Amer- 
ica (where he would have found a parish), was clapped 
into Bedford Jail, where he lay (he tells us) “twelve 
entire years.” He had no book there but the Bible and 
Fox’s Book of Martyrs. He made tag-lace to support 
his family, the while he was in jail, and bemoaned very 
much the possible fate of his poor blind daughter 
Mary. 

While he was living his prison life, country people 
in England were reading the newly printed book by 
Isaac Walton, called the Complete Angler; and during 
the same period of time, John Milton published his 
Paradise Lost; and in that Bedford Jail, in those same 
years, John Bunyan wrote the story I have told you of, 
called the Pilgrim’s Progress. 

He came out of jail afterwards, — a good two hundred 
years ago to-day, — and took to preaching again. But 
he preached no sermon that was heard so widely, or 
ever will be, .as his preachments in the Pilgrim’s 
Progress. 

He went on some errand of charity in his sixtieth 
year, and took a fever, and died in 1688. It was the 
very year in which the orthodox people of England had 
set on foot the revolution which turned out the Popish 
King James the Second, and brought in the Protestant 
William and Mary. Poor John Bunyan would have 
seen better times if he had lived in their day, and better 
yet if he had lived in ours, and written in the magazines 
as well as he wrote about Great-Heart. 


53 ^ ABOUT OLD STOkY-TELLERS. 

Live as long as you may, you can never outlive the 
people that he set up in his story. 

Messrs. Legality, and Cheat, and Love-lust, and 
Carnal-mind, we meet every day in society. Every boy 
and girl of you all will go by and by — slump — into 
some Slough of Despond ; and God help you, if the pack 
you carry into it is big ! Always, and at all times, there 
must be thwacking at dragons in our own valleys of 
humiliation ; and if the teeth of giant Pope are pulled, 
giant Despair — whatever Great-Heart may have done 
— will be sure to catch us some day in Doubting Castle, 
or somewhere else. 

In fact, I don’t much believe that Great-Heart did 
kill him ; and think — to that extent — the work is 
fictitious. 

Giant Despair lives, you may be sure of it, — perhaps 
not in that same old Doubting Castle, which was prob- 
ably pulled down. But he has a great many fine resi- 
dences — in the city, and in the country too. 

And he has a new wife ; and her name is not Diffi- 
dence now — oh, no ! but it is sometimes Dame Swag- 
ger, and sometimes Miss Spending, and sometimes 
Mrs. Dividends, and sometimes Lady Heartless. 

As for that Valley of the Shadow of Death, — who 
that has lived since Bunyan died, or who that shall live 
henceforth, may escape its bewilderments and its ter- 
rors } The poor tinker and preacher, — the zealous 
writer who made his words cleave like sharp knives, 
sleeps now quietly (to all seeming) in a grave on Bun- 
hill Fields. And we shall have our resting-places 
marked out too, before many more crops of autumn 
leaves shall fall to the ground ; but evermore, the path 


//Otv A TINKER WROTE A NOVEL. 237 

to such resting-place, for such as he, and for such as 
we, must lie straight through the awful Valley of the 
Shadow of Death. 

It would be a sad story if there were no Celestial 
City. 



Banyan's Tomb. 











JUL 29 1905 










1 


000E12Efl4EH 



